Roses in December
by frostynarrator
Summary: This is a Trinine (Tris/Jeanine) piece of fanfiction. A story of healing, strategy etc. featuring the characters' attempt to save Chicago and a lot of science and medical research. Crap at summaries, but read for yourself ;) AU and probably OOC.
1. Chapter 1

A/N: I started writing this for fun and decided to post at least the beginning because FFN needs more Trinine ;) The title is borrowed from Hannes Wader's song "Rosen im Dezember".

I don't own the storyworld or characters or, well, anything really. Except the computer I'm typing this on.

* * *

 **Chapter One**

Beatrice Prior had known for a while that she didn't belong in Abnegation. In Abnegation, she was never enough, not selfless enough, not self-effacing enough. She wasn't good at forgetting herself and turning outwards only. She wanted to leave, but her dream, the freedom of Dauntless, was unattainable.

She wasn't strong, she wasn't fast, she couldn't fight. Hell, she couldn't even run anymore. She had tried to train in secret, in the fields separated from Abnegation by the tree-line, but the months of training hadn't made her stronger, and she hated herself for it.

She had no idea what had caused it, but she had become weaker and weaker physically, her hands often shaking and with sudden pains in her right leg which left her out of breath. The extreme selflessness demanded in Abnegation had stopped her from asking for help, and she had forced herself to ignore it, a feat which had proved more and more difficult.

Ans so she had decided to wait for the test and choose whichever faction it told her she belonged in, to avoid the responsibility of choosing. And now, the test had only ruled out two factions, Candor and Amity. Dauntless was out of the question, no matter how many times her heart lead her to reconsider it, she knew she wouldn't survive there. And now, minutes before the choosing ceremony, she still hadn't made up her mind. Erudite…the idea was attractive, she had always liked intellectual challenges and loved learning. She dreamed of the promise of intellectual freedom, of researching any topic that awakened her curiosity, without the fear of censorship. But leaving Abnegation meant leaving everything she knew, everyone she loved behind. Could she do that?

"Beatrice Prior"

She stood up shakily and walked to the center of the room. Like all the others before her, she made a small incision in the center of her palm with the knife, and moved her shaking hand above the bowl filled with gray stones representing Abnegation. Was she strong enough to leave? She didn't know the answer to that.

But more importantly, was she selfless enough to stay? Could she find happiness in her faction of origin? The answer was clear, and she moved her hand above the bowl filled with still, clear water, where she let a drop of blood fall.

"Erudite"

* * *

Jeanine was as surprised as everyone else at Beatrice Prior's quick last second movement, which caused her blood to fall into the Erudite bowl. She had memorized all test results and knew that Beatrice's had been Abnegation, and she had expected her to choose to stay in Abnegation, like her brother did. With one eyebrow raised, she watched the girl walk towards the Erudite section of the room – towards her. Their eyes met for a second, Beatrice's expression hesitant and terrified, Jeanine's head to the side with one eyebrow raised. Then Beatrice looked away and moved to sit with the other initiates in the front rows.

* * *

A/N: Let me know what you think! I hadn't planned to post this fic at all at first. I have 6 chapters written out at the moment. I have the general idea of the plot outlined and know where I'm planning to go, but I'm open for suggestions.


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: Still don't own a thing :p

* * *

 **Chapter Two**

Beatrice found life in Erudite fascinating. While she still missed her family, she no longer had doubts that she had made the right choice. Jeanine Matthews had come on the first day to make a speech about the importance of knowledge and had also read the faction's manifesto, but since then, Beatrice had only caught sight of her a few times at a distance. During the two weeks of initiation, she went to classes in the morning, where she discovered many fields of study which were entirely new to her. Classes were usually taught by the researchers who had made the discoveries, with a different lecturer in every class giving them different perspectives on each subject.

Some classes were taken by all initiates, but they also had a large choice of advanced classes to discover new disciplines and start to orient themselves towards what they would specialize in after initiation. In the afternoon, she could be found in the library, where she picked a book on a subject of her choosing. By the end of the day, she had to hand in an essay on that book, summarizing but also critically analyzing its main arguments and contrasting it with her own knowledge and other texts she had come across.

All in all, it was far from what her father had condescendingly said about Erudite, that they were swallowing useless knowledge which had no use for the community. What she learned was sometimes very theoretical but it always had concrete applications. As of late, she had chosen to work with medical texts, fascinated by the way the body worked, not out of egocentricity but because she could see how it could save lives.

Of course, she had quickly realized that she herself needed to go see a doctor soon. During her first days in Erudite, she had planned to go as soon as possible, but her Abnegation background was deeply anchored in her and she felt shy at the idea of going to see someone important in the faction just to talk about herself and improve her own physical well-being.

However, in those first weeks, she was feeling more and more often tired and dizzy. It happened at random times; when she was sitting in class or studying in the library. Other symptoms had worsened too; she had tremors in her hands which would sometimes make it difficult to keep the her handwriting as elegant as required. While she was walking up stairs, a sharp pain in her right thigh would suddenly force her to clutch the banister until it became bearable again. Despite this, Tris worked hard and was ranked first at the end of initiation.

* * *

The day following the results, Jeanine summoned Beatrice to her office. Beatrice intrigued her, it was very rare to have a transfer from Abnegation, and Beatrice seemed to have kept some traits of her old faction while seemingly embracing her new one. She didn't seem to be shy, but she was modest and rather distant with the other initiates. Yet, the girl's eyes spoke of intellect and curiosity, and Jeanine had no doubt that she would find her place in Erudite.

"Ms Matthews", Beatrice said formally upon entering the faction leader's office.

Jeanine looked up from her desk and smiled at her promising recruit. "Ms Prior, sit down please." She paused as Beatrice nervously sat on the leather chair facing her, her long hair in a simple ponytail and her blue suit complimenting the color of her eyes. "I wanted to congratulate you on your performance during the last two weeks," Jeanine continued. "You have shown not only an ability to understand and memorize information, but more importantly to analyze it and criticize its weak spots. These are rare qualities in someone so young."

Beatrice smiled proudly, surprised at the praise from such an important and brilliant academic. "Thank you Ms Matthews."

"You have a few more weeks before officially starting on your first research project, but you should use that time to choose a topic and discuss it with potential labs and supervisors. Do you already know what you would like to specialize in?"

"Um, I'm really interested in medicine, but I haven't singled out one area of interest yet. I like all the medical subjects we are studying, and I like helping people." She shrugged. "But I also like interdisciplinarity, it seems to me that studying one domain while ignoring its interconnections with others can lead to avoidable mistakes."

Jeanine smirked inwardly. There she was, the intelligent and curious girl who had topped the list of initiates. Yes indeed, she was one of the most promising young additions Erudite had had in many years. "You still have some time to decide. However, you should start by lining out your ideas precisely and looking up the list of academics specialized in that field. An initiate with your results can request supervision from the very best."

* * *

A/N: This is going to be a medical fic, mainly because I find illness narratives very interesting to read and analyse, and writing one makes me more conscious of some of their features.

Also, it's AU but not too much, so the war is still going to happen, but since Jeanine is different, her role is different, and therefore it turns out differently. Anyway, I hope you like it, feedback is always greatly appreciated!


	3. Chapter 3

A/N: I'm so glad to see that the fandom isn't entirely dead, I joined the ship recently and I was afraid to be too late to the party XD

I can't reply to your reviews if you're not logged in, so I'll reply here. Concerning the war, I've worked out a way that it won't distract too much from the point. Since Jeanine and Tris will be allies, it won't be a huge thing (I think), and the story will still be entirely about them. I was thinking of leaving the violence to Dauntless Leadership yep! And I've already written the next few chapters with the same idea, Kubrick...great minds think alike haha ;)

Yes, I do take suggestions. I admit I'm writing in advance (currently writing chapter 7, it allows me to change things before I post them, and to keep posting even if I'm busy for some days), so I might not be able to integrate all suggestions if they clash with what I already wrote. But I'll definitely take them into account and try to include them.

* * *

 **Chapter Three**

During the following week, Beatrice's physical state had worsened again, and she finally decided to go to a doctor. She was nearly in constant pain, even walking had become difficult because of her right leg, and she was so tired that she sometimes zoned out while working – which was unacceptable for someone who claimed to belong in Erudite.

The first doctor she saw immediately sent her to a neurologist, who presented himself as Mr Wheeler. He made tests and quickly found the reason for her worsening symptoms: her immunity was attacking her central nervous system, an autoimmune disease known as multiple sclerosis. He immediately reassured her that Erudite's progress in medicine was such that a diagnosis of MS should not worry her, but that they would have to design a treatment course and adapt it in function of its results.

Tris' medical research meant that she did know how life-threatening and disabling MS had been in the past, but she had not researched the disease in itself apart from its place within the history of medicine, so she had to trust the doctor's word.

Mr Wheeler told her to wait in his office and left the room, muttering about a phone call. When he came back two minutes later, it was only to ask her to follow him back out. He lead her away from his office through several unfamiliar corridors until they arrived to a door she recognized: Jeanine Matthews' office. Wondering what they were doing here and rather nervous, she waited behind him as he knocked and was answered with a curt "enter".

"Mr Wheeler. And Ms Prior? To what do I owe your visit? Your call implied you had a pressing matter to discuss, but you did not mention it was about one of our new members."

"Ms Matthews, I apologize for the urgent call, but I need to talk to you privately about Ms Prior."

Shifting nervously on her feet, Beatrice watched them leave through a door to an adjoining room separated from Jeanine's office only by a simple glass wall which, she quickly realized, was sound-proof. While the doctor was talking, Jeanine's usually inexpressive face first changed to an expression of surprise, her eyebrows raised, and then her eyes widened minutely with an expression that, if Beatrice didn't know better, she would describe as one of sadness.

Suddenly, her expression cleared again and she nodded. Her lips moved briefly and she reentered the office, cutting the doctor off. "Thank you Mr Wheeler, I will take care of it," Beatrice heard as the door was opened.

"Ms Matthews, are you sure?" He asked. "Aren't you too busy to – "

"I will take responsibility for my own schedule, thank you", she answered curtly and, hearing the dismissal, he nodded and left.

Jeanine waited until the door had closed, then looked over at Beatrice, who was leaning against the wall near the door with a confused expression.

"What…" she started, but seeing her faction leader's frown, Beatrice stopped.

After a while, Jeanine broke the silence. "Ms Prior, I wish you had told me," she said. "I could have helped you."

"I– I didn't want to impose…"

"You have every right to seek medical care when you need it. This is not Abnegation." She paused, and Beatrice looked at her shoes.

"When did your symptoms start?"

Beatrice tried to remember. "One – maybe two years ago, I think." After a pause, she asked, "Why did Mr. Wheeler bring me to you specifically?"

Jeanine ignored the question. "Come with me."

Beatrice followed Jeanine through a wooden door to an elegant living room. Beatrice didn't have the time to look around as they walked through, passed a door and entered what turned out to be a lab.

Jeanine leaned against a lab table, facing Beatrice. "Nobody but me ever works in this lab, so I will ask for your discretion. It is my private lab." Beatrice's eyes widened. "But this is exactly why you are here. I have spent some time researching autoimmunity in general and MS in particular, and have developed relatively efficient treatments. However, they are all experimental, so we will have to try several of them before we find the combination which works the most favorably for you."

Beatrice nodded numbly. She was starting to feel tired and dizzy but concentrated on Jeanine's words. "Thank you, Ms Matthews. I can't start to express how grateful I am for your help." Her words were slurred by the fatigue, but they echoed with raw sincerity.

Jeanine considered the young woman before her, measuring the necessity to start a treatment as early as possible against Beatrice's obvious exhaustion before finally reaching a decision. "Come to my office tomorrow at 9 o'clock and we will discuss possible options for you."

* * *

After she had left, Jeanine went to sit at her desk, her head in her hands in a rare display of vulnerability. Why hadn't anyone noticed? Beatrice had been in Erudite for weeks, and nobody had noticed anything, not her teachers, not her classmates, and not even her. Why hadn't she noticed? She, of all people, should have seen the young woman's struggle, no matter how little of her she had seen.

Jeanine remembered how she had walked Beatrice back to the door of her office with a hand between her shoulder blades to guide and support her. They had both been equally surprised by the gesture. She was not the kind of person who would usually initiate any kind of physical contact, but the girl's tired posture and slow steps had lead her to move her arm without a conscious decision.

She sighed. They would have to spend some time discussing symptoms and treatment options the next morning. This was time that Jeanine, with her position as faction leader, certainly didn't have. She was a researcher and a politician but in no way was she a doctor.

But while she knew she technically didn't have to take care of Beatrice, she also knew that she was her only chance of near-complete recovery. The treatment plan she had developed for herself years ago was better than anything else existing, but it was still experimental and would therefore never be offered even by the best of Erudite's doctors.

And Beatrice Prior was the most promising young woman Erudite had had in years. With such potential, her research, whatever she chose to specialize into, would be groundbreaking. She felt a moral obligation to help her, since she was the only one who could. That was what had lead her to interrupt Wheeler mid-sentence as he explained Beatrice's condition and to take responsibility for her entirely, despite his surprised exclamation and her own conscience's protests.

At least, those were the only reasons she allowed herself to think of.

* * *

After this unexpected turn of events, Beatrice decided to skip dinner and go to bed early; she needed the peace and quiet of her empty dormitory to think and she was too tired and dizzy to be in a crowd anyway.

Once she was lying comfortably under the covers, she thought back on the events of the afternoon. She was confused by Jeanine's actions. She was the head of Erudite, the most important person in the entire faction, why would she give her so much of her time and attention?

But while Beatrice didn't fully understand her motives, she was grateful and determined to make the most of this opportunity, not only to heal but also to learn.

* * *

A/N: Thanks so much for reading!

I personally think that Tris wouldn't have changed her name if she hadn't been in Dauntless, I couldn't make it convincing so I left it to Beatrice, even if it's weird writing 'Beatrice' all the time. What do you think? Maybe Jean can be the one to call her that as a nickname later on ;)


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four**

The next morning found Beatrice in the corridor leading to her faction leader's office with ten minutes to spare. Apart from a dull ache in her thigh, she felt relatively energetic – probably due to a new found optimism which had appeared with the knowledge that she had a chance to improve her state.

Five minutes later, Beatrice heard the clicking sound of heels approaching and looked up to see Jeanine who nodded at her in greeting and unlocked the door. She lead her once again through her office, living room and to the laboratory.

"Have you rested well, Ms Prior?" Jeanine asked casually as she directed Beatrice to a stool.

"Yes, thank you. Mornings are usually my best times, I should be more reactive than yesterday." She smiled awkwardly.

Jeanine nodded, remembering how she used to try to do as much work as possible in the mornings because, no matter how many hours of sleep she got, her body would be exhausted and her brain foggy after a certain hour. It was a miracle that Beatrice had managed such high scores during initiation, she couldn't imagine how well she would have performed in a healthy state.

"Ms Prior, this will take some research, which will probably stretch over several weeks. It is important that you inform me when you are too tired to work. The point of all this is your health, if you exhaust yourself by overworking, there is no point in any of this." At Beatrice's hesitant nod, she continued. "Good. Now, there are two levels which we will need to address. The first, the body's autoimmune response, is our priority but it should be relatively easy as I already have a finished solution. If you react to the drug as well as my test subject did, this part will be resolved quickly. The second level is the damage that has already occurred. Not all the damage can be reversed, I'm afraid, but a lot can. Here." Jeanine handed a notebook to Beatrice, who opened it to find pages and pages full of scribbled formulas and names of chemical elements.

It was only thanks to the readings she had done in the past few weeks that Beatrice could understand the general ideas, but she could also recognize that this was far above her level – this woman was a genius.

"These," Jeanine continued with a superior smirk, "are my final notes on the drug which should stop the progression of the disease completely. Basically, its role is to enable the immune system to differentiate between what it should and should not attack. You will understand the details by reading these notes. I have three different versions of the final drug, so if the first one has problematic secondary effects, you will test out the other two."

She gestured for Beatrice to follow her to the cupboard in which her finished products were, and was just about to slide the glass aside when she suddenly a gasp from behind her. She turned around to see Beatrice supporting herself against a table, her teeth pressed together in a grimace of pain.

Jeanine rushed back to her and placed on hand on her shoulder, "Ms Prior, are you all right? Come sit down." With one arm around her shoulders, she helped her to a chair, where Beatrice sat down, painfully extending her right leg. "I'm sorry, it won't last, it usually passes in a few seconds."

Jeanine shook her head, wondering why Beatrice even felt the need to apologize. A few moments later, Tris looked up and nodded. "I'm okay now."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah." She got up and slowly walked towards the cupboard, and although Jeanine noticed how she put most of her weight on her left leg, she decided not to insist, at least not for the moment.

"What kind of pain is it?"

"It's…it's like a stabbing sensation in my thigh. It's usually dull and I can ignore it, but for short moments like just now I feel sudden sharp pains."

"Hm, that's neurological pain. The only things that help immediately are highly addictive, you'll have to do without for the moment." She browsed the shelves and finally handed Beatrice a small glass bottle of the disease-altering drug. "Take a teaspoon of this every morning. It can lead to some secondary effects – the usual, headaches and nausea – but they shouldn't be too severe. Remember to keep notes of any changes you notice. With all the medical reading you've done, I'm sure I don't need to explain to you what you should keep track of."

Beatrice smiled. "No, I do know what to look for."

* * *

Beatrice chose an isolated table in the library and opened her newly acquired notebook to the first page. She wrote:

 _Symptoms before treatment:_  
 _\- Pain in right thigh (constant ache + sudden stabbing pain);_  
 _\- Fatigue, dizziness and tremors;_  
 _\- Difficulty focusing._

When she was done, she closed her notebook and walked to a bookshelf she had started exploring the day before. She still had to find a research topic for her thesis, a supervisor specialized in the same domain and a laboratory to finance it, and time was getting short.

She wondered if her own case could serve as a research topic. It wasn't the most fascinating project, but she had to work on this anyway and it would be more efficient to dedicate her time to it officially. She knew that she could still choose a different topic afterwards for the next project; her entire academic future didn't depend on it, only the next few months.

Of course, she knew what she really wanted. She wanted to work with Jeanine Matthews, the brilliant leader who, for some mysterious reason, had decided to help and take care of her. But she couldn't ask her, she would probably laugh in the most humiliating manner and send her on her way. She had heard tales among the young Erudites about their scary leader.

Most admitted that her intellect was superior and her charisma as a leader strong, but they were also strongly intimidated by her coldness and arrogant behavior. When she walked through a room, few would look at her in the eyes, and conversations would continue in a lower volume until she had left. Nobody would dare to speak to her directly unless addressed first, and while Beatrice had been pleasantly surprised at the other woman's friendliness, she would not risk that by showing arrogance.

* * *

"Have you settled upon a research topic yet Ms Prior?" Jeanine asked when they met again in her lab two days later.

"No, Ms Matthews, not yet." She hesitated. "Well, actually, I was wondering if it wouldn't be best if I focused on the work we are doing here for the moment. I could write my thesis on the development of improved medication for example? And I have been looking up the different drugs for neurological pain and was thinking that something completely different could be created by keeping only the essence of each. Could such a project be considered acceptable material for a thesis?"

"That is entirely possible, as long as you find a lab which is willing to finance it." She paused for dramatic effect and smirked. "This lab is more than willing."

Beatrice looked up sharply. "Are you saying…" She paused, letting her words sink in. "But who… ?" She asked, not daring to hope.

Jeanine's smirk grew as she raised an eyebrow. "We've already started working, haven't we?"

* * *

A/N: Thanks so much for the suggestions!

SwanQueenSails2: I love your idea of giving Jeanine a backstory, I will work on that! I won't mention Andrew because it makes us focus on the age difference and I'd rather leave the reader the choice to picture Jeanine younger, but it's definitely a cool idea to talk about her family / friends / history.

Kubrick: Thank you, I'm happy you like this Jeanine. Good idea, it's true some others couldn't hurt. I'll see how I can introduce Cara in the next chapter :)

Again, thanks for reading, I hope you liked this chapter :)


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter Five**

And so Beatrice and Jeanine settled into the research project together. The drug created by Jeanine would need to be researched again, but all she could do at the moment in that respect was to keep taking it and write down her observations. After a long scientific discussion – which they both enjoyed immensely – they decided that the priority would be to work on a way to heal the damaged nerves. This seemed quite basic at first, but Beatrice soon realized that using a foreign substance to heal nerves would trigger the autoimmune response again, rendering the original drug useless. They knew that it might not be possible to repair the nerves and, in that case, they agreed that they would have to try and improve communication of faulty nerves.

Jeanine's already full timetable meant that only two days of her week were dedicated to research, but Beatrice nevertheless worked the other days in the library to advance the work as much as she could. She wrote down the details of every experiment and their result to advance the work on the report she would hand in at the end and researched potential new developments, both in the library and using computer simulations of potential molecules. When they met on Fridays and Saturdays, they would usually recapitulate the work she had done independently, and then advance from there together.

There were a few instances when their work was interrupted by Beatrice's symptoms, even though, thanks to the drug she was now taking daily, they were not worsening anymore. One evening, as she was particularly tired, she was embarrassed to have Jeanine wordlessly take the instruments from her hands because her movements were not precise enough for the work she was doing.

She had been in the final steps of a practical experiment in which the exactitude of the amount of each reactant was crucial. By then, she was deeply tired and feeling dizzy, but since she was sitting on a stool, it hadn't stopped her from working. Her hands, however, were shaking so much that she had trouble controlling the exactitude of her movements, a fact which had not escaped Jeanine's sharp gaze.

"Let me," Jeanine had simply said, startling Beatrice who hadn't heard her approach – a proof of how tired she was. Jeanine took the small flask from her fingers and precisely tipped the required number of drops into the mixture. Neither of them had expected the shiver that ran down their spines as their fingers brushed against each other. Their eyes met, but Beatrice looked away instantly, still too ashamed at not having been able to successfully complete the experiment on her own to process any other emotion.

"This substance is highly acidic Ms Prior," Jeanine chastised her. "You can't risk spilling some on your hands, gloves or no gloves." Her tone softened, she knew how embarrassed Beatrice must be feeling. "It was just the final step. It does not make the experiment any less your work."

Despite Beatrice's stubbornness and a few incidents similar to this one, Jeanine was proud of her student's work. However, she knew that Beatrice was wondering about her own reasons for researching autoimmunity herself – at first, and now. The girl was very bright and had noticed that the test subject she mentioned in her work was anonymous, that even the fact that there was only one subject meant that something about her project was very personal.

She was uncomfortable with the idea that the public could know about her own illness – she knew that it would be easy to use it against her to back up the argument of her being too weak for the position because she was a woman. But for some reason, she didn't really mind Beatrice knowing – maybe because the girl was going through the same ordeal, or simply because she felt genuine respect and affection for her.

Despite the difference of level between them, she enjoyed working with her more than she would have imagined; especially considering that she usually preferred working alone in order to avoid being slowed down. Beatrice was very intelligent, there was no denying that, maybe even enough to match her once she acquired the knowledge and experience, and, instead of the jealousy she would have expected, Jeanine felt a new kind of energy building in her at the prospect of working closely with her.

* * *

When she was working in the library, Beatrice liked to sit in the section containing the books she was likely to need. It was a section which was rather deserted, and truth be told, she started to need more human company, but the vacuum she had unconsciously created around her during initiation had followed her. Maybe it was because she had been distant with people during that crucial phase when friendships had started forming, her analytical mind offered, or because she had finished first, but she had not exchanged more than a few words with anyone except Jeanine in the past few weeks.

She was therefore startled when an energetic girl approached her one morning, introduced herself as Cara, and asked if she could join her the table. Despite her surprise, Beatrice nodded with a smile, and was relieved to see that Cara had not come to chat but to work, as her own book was particularly fascinating and she wasn't too keen on being interrupted.

She lost herself in her reading and note-taking once more until a soft cough brought her back to earth. Cara was looking at her.

"It's already half past noon, should we go have lunch?"

Beatrice didn't particularly want to stop working, but it was true that she was rather hungry, and she had an unhealthy tendency to skip meals when she was engrossed in her work. And, she had to admit, she could do with some company.

The two girls spent their meal talking about their research, starting with their current reading material, then digressing towards their research projects and, finding common points between them, evolving to scientific debates. Cara was self assured and rather arrogant, but also more interested in academic discussion than Beatrice's peers were, probably because she was a few years older.

From then on, they sometimes met in the library, although they also both appreciated working on their own. A couple of times, a few of Cara's friends joined them for lunch, accepting Beatrice as the newest addition to their group. Some of them were a bit weary – transfers were always less easily accepted – but her end of initiation result were public knowledge, and they had to accept that she was one of them.

* * *

It was the fourth time that she repeated the exact same experiment, and her results were, once again, different from all previous three. It was nearly five in the afternoon, she had not taken a break or even looked away since coming back from the canteen four hours before, and she was frustrated beyond measure.

From behind a computer across the room, Jeanine observed Beatrice's growing irritation for a while, then decided to step in. Scientific work was not always stubbornly working until a solution was found; sometimes, one had to step back to think, and this was exactly what Beatrice needed at that moment.

"Ms Prior, I believe you need to take some distance from the experiment."

"I don't need distance, I need to find out why this–" she started, but Jeanine, used to her own irritability when something escaped her, cut her off, unfazed.

"Come."

She lead her back to her office, and fixed some tea for both of them. "The problem when working in a lab is that you are always staying in the same place, with the same color scheme, the same atmosphere surrounding you. That sometimes leads a person to focus so much on one aspect of the practical work and forget the world outside the lab. And while focus is good, you need to remember of the bigger picture to be able to think clearly."

Beatrice nodded slowly, intrigued by this new perspective. They sat in comfortable silence for a while, drinking their tea and letting their minds wander. It felt like a luxury after spending hours focusing on one question.

"…it was you, wasn't it?" Beatrice asked suddenly.

"Hmm?" Jeanine asked, already knowing what Beatrice meant but both playing for time and reminding her that everyone was not in her head.

"Sorry," she replied, realizing her mistake. "I've been thinking about the research you made leading to the discovery of the drug I am taking now and about this mysterious test subject. And no other explanation really makes sense. You were sick yourself, weren't you? What else could have lead you to turn from the groundbreaking research that lead you to the invention of the aptitude test than a personal need for the drug?" Realizing what she was asking, she hastened to add, "sorry, it's none of by business."

"Excellent reasoning skills, Ms Prior, as ever." She sighed, hating to have to discuss it but knowing it had to come up sooner or later. "Yes, that's why I started this research. I got sick while I was working on the design of the aptitude test. It took me a few months to recognize the symptoms, but I had created the drug you are taking now within half a year of having pinpointed the problem. It wasn't my main research – you probably know that my research was centered on serums and the aptitude test. It was just a passing necessity; like it will be for you, I presume."

Beatrice nodded. "I like medicine for itself, but it's true that, like I said, I believe very strongly in the power of interdisciplinarity, so I would prefer to work with that kind of perspective." And just like that, their discussion had moved back towards scientific research, a ground on which they both felt more secure.

When they had finished their tea, Jeanine addressed the previous topic again. "Ms Prior," she started, hesitated and changed her mind. "Beatrice." Startled by the use of her first name, Beatrice looked into Jeanine's gray eyes curiously. "I need to know that I can trust you to keep what you have learned for yourself."

"Of course. This is our work, our project, what we discuss stays between us. I appreciate your trust, I would never jeopardize it, Ms Matthews."

"Jeanine please," she corrected with an affectionate smile and received a radiant smile in return, a light blush covering the younger woman's cheeks.

* * *

A/N: Thanks for reading, let me know what you think! :3


	6. Chapter 6

A/N: This chapter contains some descriptions of pain, nothing worth a TW and nothing over the T rating, but here's a small warning just in case. Anyway, some backstory for Jean here, and there's finally some hint of the beginning of the war sub-plot :)

* * *

 **Chapter Six**

They were scheduled to work together that Friday as usual, and Jeanine had had an exhausting week. The weekly meeting with the other faction leaders had left her suspicious of Dauntless; Max and his crowd were behaving even more arrogantly than usual, giving her sharp mind the impression that something was going on. With the usual mindset of Dauntless and their recent turn towards even more violence and competition, Jeanine couldn't imagine that whatever they were planning could be good.

Between the emotional stress that this caused, the fact that her administrative work as a leader had kept her from sleeping more than a few hours per night for several nights in a row, and the onset of a very cold weather, Jeanine could not say that she was very surprised when she woke up with her hip aching one morning. To be honest, she was rather surprised it had taken so long for this particular symptom to resurface, considering that a painful left hip had been her main symptom, the only one which had persisted after the development of the drug. She had not found the time to research solutions for neurological pain yet and her logical mind ruled out the idea of taking addictive substances unless absolutely necessary, so she had instead learned to hide any afflictions from the public – a skill she had become rather successful at.

And yet, halfway through the day in the laboratory with Beatrice, the pain had intensified to the point that her iron self-control had begun to slip. She was starting to limp visibly as each step caused a sharp pain radiating from her hip up her left side when she had to fetch a book or a reactant. Beatrice had noticed, she was sure, but she didn't remark on it, a fact for which she was very grateful.

They worked in quiet concentration for another while, but as she went to her desk to fetch a file one hour later, the pain was overwhelming, she was walking slowly and had to support herself on the lab tables as she limped past them. Her entire side was very weak, the pain wrapping around her rib cage and upper back making even standing difficult – she hadn't had an attack this bad in more than a year.

Beatrice had given up her pretense of not noticing and was watching her worriedly, unsure of whether her intervention would be welcome, yet hating herself for feigning indifference. However, when Jeanine stopped to lean against a table with her eyes closed and her head tilted slightly backward, breathing shallowly through her slightly parted lips, Beatrice finally rushed over to her, laying a hand on her arm – the only support she dared to give.

"What's wrong Jeanine?"

"Nothing. I can do this." Jeanine's voice was weak and tight with pain, but she opened her eyes and resolutely resumed her slow progression. She quickly had to stop again, even though she was only steps away from her seat at the table at which she had been about to keep working. The pain was making her nauseous, black spots impairing her vision as she struggled to force her left side to support her weight.

"Jeanine, please," Beatrice tried again, "the work can wait, you should rest."

Jeanine closed her eyes and nodded in resignation. She hated displaying any weakness or vulnerability, particularly as she was not alone, but knew that nothing but rest would allow her to recover her strength.

"Let me help you," Beatrice said, guiding Jeanine's arm around her shoulders. She had to bend a little to accommodate her slightly shorter size and supported her with an arm around her waist. Together, they slowly made their way to the living room Beatrice had only seen in passing. She helped Jeanine sit on the sofa and watched worriedly as the usually stern woman rested her head on the back of the sofa with her eyes closed.

"Will you be okay?"

"Yes. Thank you, Beatrice. Can you take care of cleaning up the lab?" She asked quietly.

"Of course," she replied, her hand lingering on her shoulder for a moment as a silent gesture of comfort before leaving the room.

* * *

Jeanine stayed on the sofa for a few minutes to catch her breath before she retreated to her private rooms. She'd rather avoid falling asleep in the living room through which Beatrice would most probably pass in a little while on her way out. It took all her will to reach her private rooms, and once the door was closed, she removed her shoes and jacket, limped to her bed, and slowly eased herself on the mattress, fully clothed, to think.

She had been taken aback by Beatrice's kindness. She hadn't let anyone come close to her for years, she had mostly worked alone, even managing to avoid company when she had been forced to work in other labs before she launched her own.

While she had had friends and family as a child and teenager, the bonds were always there primarily aimed at fulfilling social expectations and creating a functional society. Affection and kindness were a long way down on the list, if they were there at all.

Her parents had raised her like many Erudite children, though probably with less warmth than most, valuing intellectual capacities and the pursuit of knowledge more than familial bonds. She had been taught that loneliness was a childish feeling which had to be overcome, the craving for company a weakness to be controlled. She had easily learned to treasuring knowledge over anything else, her intellect was her pride, and she had worked restlessly to make the most of it.

Her role as a leader, like her status as the most intelligent person in the city, had placed her at the very top of the faction. She was the center of attention, frequently had to attend meaningless formal evenings, make speeches, and meet with other leaders. All in all, she was usually very happy to avoid social interaction in her own free time and had never consciously felt any desire for more human contact.

But while she wasn't used to sharing her personal time with anyone, the now-informal interactions with Beatrice felt natural. Contrary to what she would have thought, she enjoyed their interaction during the days they were scheduled to research. She liked hearing Beatrice's enthusiasm when she understood a new idea, seeing her turn to her to understand more. She wasn't even bothered by the physical contact which had taken place several times out of necessity, nor with the casual touches which had begun to occur when they talked, and this fact puzzled her. But she felt genuine affection for Beatrice, and although her conscience was flashing warning signals, she was glad that this research project had become grounds for a new friendship.

She did not work that evening. Although she was already late on her paperwork and could not afford this time off, she also knew that by that point, she did not have a choice. The longer she kept pushing herself, the more rest she would need once she finally crashed, and so, for the first time in weeks, she spent an evening reading until she finally fell in an exhausted sleep.

* * *

The next day, Beatrice wasn't sure if she should show up for their usual Saturday session, but since she had not received a message to cancel the meeting, she went to knock on Jeanine's office door at the same time as she always did.

When she pushed the door open after she heard a steady "enter", Jeanine was sitting at her desk as usual. She greeted her silently with a smile but kept typing on her computer for a few minutes. As she leaned against the wall and watched her work, Beatrice felt that something had shifted between them. While she had treated her as an equal since the beginning of their research, her behavior the previous day spoke of genuine trust, something Beatrice felt was incredibly precious, especially coming from such a private person.

She used the rare opportunity to observe her from her spot against the wall. Jeanine was wearing trousers for once, of a blue so dark it was nearly black, and a turtle neck jumper of a more vivid blue which hugged her form. No jewelry – that was impractical, especially when working all day in a lab with volatile substances which risked to react to metal.

She was sitting with her legs folded under her chair and her feet crossed at the ankles, her gaze focused on the screen, and Beatrice marveled at the intensity of the gray eyes sparkling with intelligence, at how every feature showed her concentration, the small line between her eyebrows, the firm set of her mouth.

Finally, she straightened, ordered the papers lying on her desk in a stack, and got up, and Beatrice noticed that she had to rely heavily on her hands to hoist herself up from her seat and she was still putting most of her weight on her right side. "Are you sure you're well enough to work today Jeanine? I can do some progress on my own if you need more rest."

"I'm sure you can, but it's all right, I need to be up and moving. I might cut the day off a bit earlier than usual if I have to, but for now, let's get to work," she said, walked around Beatrice to lock her office door and went through the door leading to her lab. She was still limping but she did look much better, so Beatrice decided to trust her judgment and followed her to the lab.

The day progressed like any other day in the lab. They worked in companionable silence, with Beatrice asking a few questions once in a while and Jeanine coming to check on her work every hour or so, but otherwise working on her own projects.

"I don't understand why you refuse to take something for the pain just once," Beatrice suddenly said as she watched Jeanine slowly regain her seat. Her limp was getting worse again as the day advanced, stress and exhaustion obviously worsening the pain. "I mean, I understand that antidepressants are the only drug that help for neurological pain, and that you don't want to risk addiction, but taking a small dose just once would make a big difference, maybe even give your system the strength it needs to recover from the attack."

"I will if it doesn't get better before I have to be in public on Monday," Jeanine replied absentmindedly. She still hoped she wouldn't need to. She had a strict routine of physical exercise, knowing that a strong body was the key to a strong mind, and, as a result, she was fit and strong, which usually allowed her to recover quickly. However, attacks of this severity were rare, and with the amount of stress she was under, she knew it would take a while this time. "I actually have to make a speech in public on Monday afternoon and there is a formal event after that where I have to stay, so I might have to overdose on antidepressants then just to be able to move around during the whole evening as if nothing was wrong. I'm not taking some now just for comfort when I might have to take more in two days, that's a very slippery road."

Beatrice sighed. She understood Jeanine's logic and even agreed with it to some extent, but she could see that she was overworked and was starting to worry about her.

* * *

A shiver ran down Jeanine's spine as she looked at the shelves of experimental serums. She had entered a lab specializing in serums to borrow a substance she needed which she remembered being used in certain serums. But as she opened the cupboard, there were far more different kinds of serums than those which had ever been officially approved, she was sure of it. What worried her even more was that there were some serums which she did not recognize, particularly the amber liquid which filled the majority of the small doses on the two lowest shelves. She took one of them from the back and discretely rearranged the row so that it didn't look like one of them was missing.

As the head of the faction, she could easily demand an explanation, but it was likely that whoever had risked making serums illegally would be prepared to do far more than lie to protect their project. Therefore, she preferred to keep her knowledge quiet and investigate it directly herself to know what she was dealing with. It could simply be a silly new member who wanted to make money by selling illegal serums; she'd had to deal with that before. But something told her that it wasn't just that, and she dreaded to know what the small dose in her hand contained.

* * *

A/N: As always, your thoughts, criticism and suggestions are very welcome!


	7. Chapter 7

A/N: As rfc1989 wrote in the first author's note of their story _The Holiday_ , Veronica Roth has mentioned that Jeanine suffers of deep anxiety. The quote from Roth is in the Buzzfeed article "19 Things You Should Know About The 'Divergent' Series From Author Veronica Roth". I don't think I'll go into detail about it in the story, but there are subtle hints here and there, so if you spot them and wonder, you know why. I'm including it because it fits with the way I see her as a character; robot-like from everyone's point of view, but actually very vulnerable and scared.

On another note, thank you so much for your reviews!

* * *

 **Chapter Seven**

In the two weeks since she had started the treatment, Beatrice's health had improved dramatically. While she hadn't yet, of course, found a way to reverse nerve damage, just the fact that her illness had stopped progressing changed her life. The fatigue had nearly entirely disappeared, she felt better and stronger. The tremors and the pain were as a result much easier to deal with. She had even started a small routine of light physical activity, nothing more than a slow jog a few times a week, but it made a big difference, she slept better and felt more energetic as a consequence. But while her health was much improved, Jeanine's physical and emotional state were visibly deteriorating as a result of the increasing stress placed on her.

Beatrice could see that something was very wrong – Jeanine's makeup wasn't enough to hide the shadows of exhaustion under her eyes and the lines of tension around her mouth. It was clear that she had not recovered from the attack, and in addition to the slight limp she had stopped hiding in front of Beatrice when it became too painful, she had developed a cough which, to Beatrice's ears and now-informed brain, sounded like the result of panic-induced shallow breathing. She wondered what was going on, but until then, she had not dared to ask, as it was probably faction matters which did not concern her and which Jeanine may not want to share.

But she was worried for her, for the woman she was starting to consider a friend, her brilliant research partner, and so she decided to at least offer her help. The first time she did, she shyly asked if everything was "all right", to which she unsurprisingly only received a noncommittal sound in response. The second time was as they were preparing to start working in the lab on a Friday morning. Jeanine was choosing her equipment and methodically sterilizing each item before placing it neatly on one of the tables, her eyes unfocused and her mind visibly elsewhere, which in itself was already worrying. Beatrice wondered how to approach the topic again without receiving a rebuttal for it.

"Jeanine, I understand if it's none of my business, but is there anything I can do to help?" she tried.

"I don't know what you–" she started, but she realized how unconvincing the lie was and changed her tactic. "Thank you, but you can't."

Beatrice sighed.

The third time she addressed the problem was only a few hours later, as they were cleaning the lab before parting for a lunch break. "I wish you'd tell me what's wrong," she said with a sigh.

Instead of snapping like Beatrice had expected her to, Jeanine didn't answer. In truth, she was already considering telling her, as she knew she needed an ally, but her habit as a leader was to trust as few people as possible. Nobody knew that she was aware of the secrete alliance between part of Erudite and part of Dauntless, and it was much safer that way. As long as nobody knew, nobody could suspect her of interfering, and it would as a result be possible to do so. If they knew that she knew, she would be watched much more closely – or neutralized in a more direct way.

Her instincts, however, told her to trust Beatrice, and her rational mind agreed that she did need an ally, and Beatrice, as one of the smartest people in the faction – definitely the smartest among those she trusted – was the best candidate, so she nodded slowly. "We can talk about it over lunch if that works for you."

To say Beatrice was surprised would be an understatement, but she didn't have to think about her answer. "Of course." They went to the cafeteria separately so as to attract less attention. Beatrice went first, and once she had come back with her lunch, Jeanine went to fetch her own.

"Beatrice," Jeanine started when they were settled around the coffee table in her living room, "there is some information that I cannot give you. Very few people know it even exists, and only one other person knows as much as I do." Jeanine didn't even consider telling her that that person was Natalie Prior, it would only confuse and anger her, and it wasn't necessary information. "What is important now is that an alliance has formed between groups who want this information. They do not know what it contains but they do know how important it is, and they are planning…they will go to extreme measures to access to it"

Beatrice frowned. Jeanine was being annoyingly enigmatic, but she probably had a reason, so Beatrice tried to focus on what she had actually told her. "Who are these groups? And," she dreaded the answer to the second question, "what kind of 'extreme measures' are we talking about?"

"Dauntless leadership and a part of Erudite have allied. I don't know the exact composition of the Erudite group; I have identified some of them, but I ignore how many they are. Which is why I was – and still am – so insistent on keeping it a secret. They cannot know that I know, or there will be literally nothing I can do to stop them. And as I do not know who they are, anyone is a potential threat." Jeanine looked at Beatrice intently, she didn't want to regret having shared this information with her. It wasn't that she suspected her of being a spy for that group, the very idea was ridiculous, but it was necessary that she realize the importance of staying silent even with people she trusted.

The girl nodded, confirming that she understood the warning behind her words. "Dauntless and Erudite..." she mused.

"Yes. They may not sound like much, but together, they can do terrible things." Seeing Beatrice's blank expression, she decided to let the other shoe drop. "Manipulation. A few members of Erudite have created a serum which controls the mind entirely. When they decide to strike, they will have an army of mindless soldiers – if all of Dauntless were injected with the serum, they would be ready to kill without a second thought if ordered to do so."

Beatrice looked at her with wide eyes – this was much worse than anything she had been able to imagine. "Can this serum be resisted? Fought? Or maybe could we make a serum which immunizes against it?"

"I don't know if such a serum could be made, but it would require some time, probably years of research. As no immunizing serum exists to date, the entire process would need to be researched and created from scratch. I don't know when they are planning to strike, but I would guess that it will happen in the coming week, it would be pointless to start researching now. As for fighting it, in theory, yes, but what would trigger that will? Since they are stripped of their thoughts and emotions, they have no reason to try to fight it. Apart from Divergents, nobody can resist a serum, it takes over one's mind entirely and takes away everything which makes them a person."

Beatrice froze. _Divergents_. She hadn't heard that word since her aptitude test. The word that meant that she was not normal. She had followed Tori's orders and not talked to anyone about it, and she hadn't tried to find out more, so she did not know what it meant, apart from the fact that her brain worked differently.

She had tried to put it out of her head and had nearly succeeded in convincing herself that it didn't matter, but the word had come up again. She could resist serums? What did that say about what being Divergent really meant?

Why hadn't she researched that since she had arrived? Deep down, she knew why; she was afraid of what it could reveal about her. But this wasn't only about her anymore. "I need to do some research on that. I understand what you say but I don't have enough knowledge to critically engage with it, which is necessary to find a solution."

Jeanine nodded. "I'm afraid there isn't a real solution, Beatrice, maybe some way to minimize the damage they will do, but…"

"Can I come back tomorrow after I've done some reading? I know we don't usually meet on Sundays and that you're busy, but–"

"No, you're right, this is an emergency," she interrupted. "I'm afraid the day will be quite busy and I can't get away without explaining my absence, but can you arrange to come in the evening after dinner?"

"Of course."

"Try not to be seen, but if you are, come anyway and simply ask to access the lab for an experiment. You work within this lab and you are entitled to access it so it will work as a likely explanation – it is important that we remain inconspicuous." After a pause, she changed topics. "I'm afraid things will be happening quickly in the coming weeks, but you should still focus first on your research. It is important for your future in Erudite as well as for your health."

"But surely this is more important, now that the disease is not progressing anymore, the research can wait…isn't there a way to put it on temporary pause officially?"

Jeanine was surprised but, naturally, she didn't show it. "Is this really what you want? Or is it what you think you should do, out of _selflessness_?"

"Both. I don't want to simply work on my thesis if the city is about to explode into war. The research is only for comfort and is not actually urgent, other work I could be doing would be more beneficial for the whole city."

"How very Abnegation of you. Speaking of your research, how are you feeling, physically?" She asked, wanting to make sure that this break was something she could allow herself.

"I'm okay," she shrugged, then added in a more analytical tone, "I still have most of the symptoms I originally had, but nothing is as intense as it used to be. The nerve pain in my leg is still there, but only as a dull pain, nothing like it was before, and the tremors and dizziness only appear when I'm tired at the end of the day. Nothing really extreme anymore."

Jeanine nodded, happy with the way Beatrice's condition had evolved. She knew from Beatrice's original medical scans that her illness was not as aggressive as her own had been, and despite the fact that she had waited a long time before seeking help, she was quite sure that, once they had found better treatment options, Beatrice would make a full recovery in time. "Very well then, if you're sure, you can probably afford to put the research on hold. You can still change your mind later, but for the moment, you can prioritize the most pressing issue."

"Thank you," she said with a smile, then added, "until tomorrow, then."

As she started to leave, Jeanine called her back. "Oh, Beatrice?"

"Yes?"

"Be careful with what books you are seen with. I do not think that you will be watched, but library checkouts are recorded, so you will have to read the most obvious texts in the library to avoid notice."

Beatrice was wearing a wry smile. "You mean that I can't borrow twenty books about serums, mind manipulation, and divergence?" She joked, and Jeanine answered with a smile. It was nice to still be able to share a laugh despite the situation.

* * *

A/N: Thanks for reading! Let me know what you think – as always, I welcome general thoughts as well as constructive criticism and suggestions, as they all help me improve :)


	8. Chapter 8

A/N: The idea which starts to develop towards the end of this chapter belongs to the amazing TrinineWriter. She wrote this idea at the beginning of her piece Like You Do as background information of how the ship came to be, and gave me permission to use it as a prompt for a part of my story's plot (thanks so much again!), so credits to her.  
Small trigger warning for a short reference to panic/anxiety.

* * *

 **Chapter Eight**

When Beatrice had left, Jeanine wondered if she shouldn't simply tell her everything. Beatrice was smart, maybe she would be able to improve their hopes a little. No matter how smart she herself was, she knew that two good minds would always be better than one.

But Jeanine was afraid, because while Beatrice fit perfectly into Erudite, her test results had been Abnegation. What if she had aptitude for both? What if she was Divergent? Part of her refused to believe in that possibility, but she knew that it was very likely, nothing else would allow such a brilliant mind to receive an Abnegation result, or to hesitate for so long at the choosing ceremony.

And if she found out about the message, about Edith Prior, about the world outside, would she want to rejoin them? Of course she would. But would she be on their side even if she knew how the Genetically Damaged were treated by the Bureau? Somehow, Jeanine doubted that. Her fear of Divergents was public knowledge, but she was too logical a person to be prone to paranoia. The young woman she had been working with for weeks was levelheaded and had a strong sense of morality, – it was highly unlikely that a society in which one group was considered inferior by another because of their genes would appeal to her.

Which meant that, if she wanted to tell her the truth, she would have to tell her the whole truth. Not only about the outside world, but also about their system of values, the aim of the experiment, about David, the bureau's propaganda and the extreme poverty in which Genetically Damaged people lived outside of the city.

* * *

The next evening found Beatrice entering Jeanine's office a little after eight. Everyone was still in the cafeteria, which had allowed her to walk up without meeting anyone on her way.

Jeanine was in her office, pacing restlessly, the now-milder pain when walking was helping her focus and clear her head from the panic which had been building up during the day. She had felt helpless, she had spent one more day making meaningless speeches and discussing trial procedures with Candor leadership all the while running possible options in her head concerning the future.

She was entirely powerless, she could keep her knowledge for herself and passively wait for the attack she knew was coming. Or she could trust another faction and create an alliance, but fighting would never be in their favor if Dauntless were going to use the serum (in vapor form or similar) against them. They would end up controlled entirely by their orders and would probably even deliver the data themselves, only realizing what they had done when they woke up from the simulation. None of these options sounded appealing.

When Beatrice entered, Jeanine looked pale, but her posture still spoke of pride and power, an attitude she was always able to maintain in public. When she saw that Beatrice was alone, she relaxed slightly and beckoned her through to her living room, as always locking her office door first.

She had spent the day thinking over her possibilities and had decided to share her knowledge with Beatrice. Alone, she had already lost; what could be worse?

And so she told her. She told her how their city was only a small part of a much bigger world, with other cities like theirs. How, to those outside, they were only a scientific experiment, aiming at restoring pure genes. That Divergents were called "Genetically Pure" there, that they were the purpose of the experiment, and that, if there were too many of them, Chicago would be disbanded like other experiments have been before. She told her about the Bureau of Genetic Welfare, and how the so-called Genetically Damaged lived in complete misery in separate neighborhoods, with fewer rights and no chance of development.

Beatrice listened with wide eyes, her look of surprised slowly turning to one of complete and utter shock as her mind struggled to process the information. This changed everything she had been told since she was a child about the city's history as well as everything she had found out about Divergents that morning. Jeanine talked quickly, her irregular breathing indicating that she was trying not to panic as she spilled out all she knew, the facts which explained the mess they were in, despite her own principle of never trusting anyone unless absolutely necessary.

"That's the real reason why Divergents are dangerous, they are a threat to our whole society because if they become too numerous, the Bureau will end Chicago," she concluded her speech. "And if Divergents find out, they will make themselves known so that this happens earlier, they might even go past the wall to meet the people of the Bureau. But it will be the end for the majority of the city's inhabitants."

They were both silent for some time, then, Beatrice spoke. "Jeanine, I think we should look at it from another perspective. The ultimate goal is not to destroy Divergents, it is to protect the city. Today's research showed me that they are considered dangerous because they cannot be manipulated, but that's also what makes them important, they cannot be forced into violence."

"I know that, Beatrice, but when they find the data, when they know what it says–"

"The content of the data isn't the point right now. As long as we can protect it, its contents don't matter. We're all threatened by death, the leaders of Dauntless and a crowd of mindless but fully trained soldiers will attack soon, that's what needs to be focused on, protecting the people and the data."

"That's what I am focusing on! What do you think I have been doing for the past week?" Her voice had risen in anger, and she had to stop as a hacking coughing fit racked her body. Her arms wrapped around her torso as the coughing resonated with the pain from the last attack. She swore between irregular breaths, trying to control the panic rising inside her.

"Jeanine, I'm sorry, that's not how I meant it. I know you're doing what you can," Beatrice said in a softer voice, sitting next to Jeanine and placing her hand on her shoulder in a gesture of comfort. She waited a few minutes in silence, rubbing her shoulder soothingly until her breathing approached normal again. "Listen," she started, explaining her point. "What I mean is that we know that Divergents can fight the serum. We can use that to protect the data and the peace. If Dauntless invades Erudite, they will have the ability to inject anyone with the serum. So of the entirety of Erudite and Dauntless, only Divergents are sure to keep their will. If we cast them as enemies, we have no chance! But if we had a group of Divergents in charge of the most important posts in Erudite, fully aware of the coming attack and at least some of its implications, the data could be protected until they managed to shut the simulation down. They would need to be trained and it would require a lot of organization, but once that would be done, the data would be safe. At the very least, we would stand a chance."

"An elite group of Divergents…" Jeanine said, impressed. She had never thought of such a thing, she wondered why.

And then she remembered why. Divergents would never fight for Chicago if they knew that they had this possibility of luxury in the outside world of Genetically Pures. They had no interest in keeping the experiment away from the Bureau's hands. "No," she said. "No, they'll never fight for this. No Divergent would fight for a world of Genetically Damaged like me."

Heartbroken by the tone of utter defeat in her voice, Beatrice spoke without thinking of the implication of her words. "I will."


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter Nine**

"No Divergent would fight for a world of Genetically Damaged like me."

Heartbroken by the tone of utter defeat in her voice, Beatrice spoke without thinking of the implication of her words. "I will."

A deafening silence reigned after Beatrice's words. Her eyes were wide, horrified that she had spilled her secret before even knowing if Jeanine would agree to try to ally with them, to stop seeing them as a threat. Jeanine had frozen in place, she didn't even seem to be breathing.

"Jeanine, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to say it like that. It's true that I am… that I'm Divergent, but I'm not against you. I'm on your side, no matter what life is offered to me outside the wall, I promise. Please, Jeanine, don't–"

"It's not like I hadn't suspected it, Beatrice. No one with your intellect receives Abnegation results at the aptitude test, it simply doesn't make any sense." She took a deep breath. "You have aptitude for Erudite and Abnegation?"

"…and Dauntless."

Jeanine inhaled sharply. "Three factions…that's extremely rare, maybe even unique…" She shook her head. "I trust you, Beatrice, I don't know why, but I do." She was terrified that she would regret trusting her, but the truth was, she did mean it. And she had no choice. "And this alliance is our best, no, our only–" she started, but was cut off as her computer emitted a long beeping sound. She jumped up and rushed to it, switching desktops until she landed on the one which had generated the sound. Abnegation.

At that moment, her phone rang. "Yes," Beatrice heard her say, and after a moment, "yes, I just saw, but we have no forces to stop them. No, the Dauntless soldiers are very probably all there, under the control of the simulation, and Erudite itself has no firepower." Silence. "Yes, do that. And if you come across any Divergents, do all you can to save them from exposure and offer them shelter in Erudite. Yes, that's what I said," she snapped. "Do not harm them. Good. Call me when you have news," she added and ended the call.

"What's happening?" Beatrice asked at once.

"Dauntless have launched the simulation and sent their forces to attack Abnegation."

Beatrice paled. "A-Abnegation? Why?"

"To take their place as the governing faction, I imagine." It made sense – they would take power first, to be in a position to do a legal coup afterwards and be able take the information from Erudite without anyone stopping them.

"What can we do? How can we stop them?" Beatrice's voice was shaking.

Jeanine was pacing again. "I sent a team to try to shut down the simulation, but it's in Dauntless, it's a fortress. I have no idea if they will be able to enter it, let alone…"

"I need to go."

"Don't be stupid, what do you think you can do to stop them?"

"My family is there, Jeanine."

"There are thousands of Dauntless soldiers, fully trained, armed, and under the serum, there is no way for you to go there and come out alive." As Beatrice opened her mouth, Jeanine foretold her. "And a Dauntlessly noble sacrifice," she sneered while saying the word, "would not help anyone. Your work is here in Erudite – once my team brings back the Divergents from Dauntless, you'll be able to help, organizing the alliance, planning the defense."

It was the longest night of Beatrice's life. She spent the time pacing, trying to work, to read or anything to distract herself from the worry, but in vain. Jeanine didn't ask her to leave her office, and the company was a welcome distraction – she would certainly have lost her mind had she been alone in her apartment.

Jeanine knew that there wasn't much hope for Beatrice's family. Andrew Prior was on the council and probably one of the targets of the raid if the aim was indeed to take power. Her heart ached for the young woman who was restlessly pacing and paler than ever, but her own worries were mainly concentrated on the bigger picture.

Tonight, the peace had been lost. Tonight, Dauntless leaders had officially become her enemies as they killed thousands of people in order to establish a military regime. From now on, she would have to fight. Until she had restored the peace, she would not be able to go back to her life of academic research and scientific focus. She felt the weight she had felt on her shoulders for the past weeks double.

At the same time, she now had both a plan and an ally, and she knew that they stood a chance, so she did not feel as hopeless as she had done previously, instead filled with strong determination. The weight was heavier, but they were two strong-minded and highly intelligent people who trusted each other, they would be able to carry it together.

Jeanine's phone rang a few hours later. Beatrice was sitting on a low chair in the corner. She had a book open in her lap, but Jeanine was sure that she had not even registered its title. Jeanine was working on her computer, analyzing the serum's molecules to understand it better. Not that she was going to need this knowledge, but understanding made her feel more in control, and the familiar work helped her stay calm.

The call came from a different source than the previous one, a bad sign. The simulation had finally been stopped, in time to avoid the worst, but it had taken more time than they had hoped and a lot of lives had been lost. The assistant explained that the team had at first failed to enter Dauntless Headquarters, but help had come in an unexpected way. A group of Divergent Dauntless soldiers who had not been controlled by the serum had rebelled and also planned to stop the simulation, so they had helped the few Erudites who had survived. Together, they had fought their way to the control room, ending the simulation seconds before the final mass execution and saving countless lives. The Dauntless had accepted their offer of shelter and were now in Erudite.

* * *

Beatrice's memories of the night were both hazy and nightmarish. She remembered the endless wait for news, the long-awaited call and again, the wait for more information. She remembered finally seeing some images of security cameras, not recognizing her family in any of the pictures of survivors, and losing hope as time passed and she still had no news. She remembered curling up in her chair, her arms around her knees and her head between her arms, and hoping that it was only a dream, that she would wake up in her bed and nothing would have happened, but she knew it was all too real.

Jeanine alternated between her role as a leader, which included passing phone calls and sounding in control, her personal guilt, and her sadness for her friend's now-likely loss. Compassion was not in her nature, she was rarely able to express or even feel any emotion the way other people did, but the affection she felt for Beatrice woke emotions in her she hadn't known she was capable of. She hated seeing the young woman broken, she felt guilty for not having been able to stop this attack, for Erudite's participation in it, knowing that hundreds of people were now mourning like the young woman in front of her, unable to believe that it had even happened.

She wanted to comfort her, but had no idea how and, deep down, she knew that right now, Beatrice couldn't be comforted. Instead, she let her stay in her office, with the hope that company helped at least a little, and did all the work that could be done, that which could not wait. Beatrice stayed numb, unable to cry or react much at all. That would come later, once she was alone and reality finally sunk in. In the early hours of the morning, Jeanine suggested she get some sleep and they parted in silence, knowing that each was hurting but unable to communicate their pain.

* * *

A/N: I'm so sorry I kept things canon here and killed characters off! Don't hate me... *hides*


	10. Chapter 10

A/N: You'll meet again some of the old crowd here...

 **Chapter Ten**

The next morning, Jeanine met with the Dauntless Divergent newcomers in a large meeting room connected to her office. They had been assigned a large apartment with a dormitory on the same floor as her office, and had been warned that, apart from these their rooms and her office, no place in Erudite was safe from potential listening devices.

Once they were all settled around the table, Jeanine explained the situation to them. She explained that Erudite was going to be attacked next and that, to avoid meeting any resistance, the Dauntless had found a way to inject the serum massively and put everyone under the simulation without needing cooperation or even time – though she had been unable to find out exactly how. She explained how Divergents would therefore be their only chance of resistance against the attack, because they would keep their own mind and be the only ones able to protect Erudite.

She did not mention the data, but chose to simply tell them that the Dauntless would stop at nothing in their hunger for power, and that a lot of political power lay in the knowledge owned by Erudite – not to mention the serums and technology, which, at the hands of Dauntless, could be disastrous.

They asked about the timing of the attack, something she could only speculate upon, but she still did her best to explain what she knew. "I'm afraid it will happen quickly as they will not want us to have had time to react. My guess would be in one to two weeks, but we need to be ready as soon as possible in case it is even before that." Her pronouncement was met with silence. A few questions were asked, problems were raised and discussed.

She knew she was manipulating them, they thought that they were protecting Erudite so that Dauntless could not access the serums and technology to kill Divergents. They thought they were protecting themselves.

But she did not feel any guilt at this manipulation, she knew it had to be done so that they would protect the peace, protect life inside the fence, which was what really mattered. Stopping the Bureau from dismantling Chicago was her first priority, and if she had to manipulate to achieve that goal, so be it.

Beatrice would probably not be happy with the lie, but what could she do? Tell them all the truth, and risk them deciding to go out to meet the Bureau to find this new life of prosperity as the Pure? That would be the end for the rest of them, those who were not Divergent. The lies were necessary, she told herself, and if she succeeded at protecting the majority, they would be worth it.

* * *

The alliance was not without tension. At first, Jeanine had been annoyed to find out that her team had not only brought back Divergents, but also a few members of Dauntless who were not Divergent but who, once woken from the simulation, had rebelled against their leaders and followed their Divergent friends to Erudite. However, the Dauntless – Divergents and non-Divergents – had protested, arguing that they were a group, and that they could all help when the simulation was not in effect.

Later on the same day, Jeanine decided to extend the call to all Divergents of the city. She broadcast a short message to the whole city saying that, as Divergents were hunted and killed on sight by the new military regime, Erudite would offer them shelter.

It was a risk, she was conscious of it. Anyone who approached Erudite would be suspected of being Divergent and could be killed on sight by Dauntless soldiers. However, with the help of a few cars which were sent to Amity and Candor, she managed to recruit a considerable number of Divergent allies – she hadn't really realized that there were so many of them and was glad that she was fighting with them and not against them, contrary to her original plans.

Naturally, she knew that they could not all fight, and Amity were likely to refuse the idea entirely, but they were equally needed to fill all main positions in Erudite with people who could resist the serum.

In barely two days, she had recruited a team of Divergents, organized training sessions and started a plan for the next few days. Everything was happening very quickly, and Jeanine was on autopilot. She spent time discussing strategy with the few Erudites she trusted; they sketched out the possible attack patterns and the best way to counter them. They calculated the odds of each defense technique for each attack pattern, contrasted the results with the likeliness of each attack to finally decide on a method which had the best chance of success, regardlessly of the tactic the Dauntless would ultimately choose.

The fact that nobody knew exactly who the traitors in Erudite were made the situation much more difficult to handle, as it meant that she was able to trust very few people. She could not risk leaking their plan to someone who spied for Dauntless, and had to keep from sharing important discussions with anyone who wasn't in the small list of people she was absolutely sure of, even if it meant she was doing nearly everything herself.

She worked restlessly through the day and until the early hours of the morning, then allowed herself a few hours of sleep, and started again. No matter how difficult it was to wake up and be fully functional after less than four hours of sleep on a daily basis, the fact that the future of the city depended on her work was enough to motivate her and give her the strength to keep this rhythm, day after day.

She organized their strategy as well as their preparation to defending the data, made allies, tried to add more people to the list she could trust and narrow down the list of suspects of helping Dauntless.

She knew this tempo was not one she could maintain for long, it would only be a matter of days before she collapsed. She had already had to break her own principle and had started to take medication regularly. For her, the plan was more important than anything else, and her own tiredness was a price she was willing to pay. She felt exhausted and was often overtaken by waves of dizziness, but she hoped she would be able to hold on long enough to make the plan work. After all, it wouldn't be long until it all ended, one way or another.

* * *

Three days after the attack on Abnegation, Beatrice went to sit at an empty table in the corner the cafeteria. She had an open book on the table to make it clear that she was not ready for socializing, but it was only a few minutes later when she saw Cara approach and sitting at her table. Beatrice sent her a half-hearted smile but otherwise ignored her and the plate she laid out in front of her.

"You should eat something," Cara said, and Beatrice looked away. After a silence, Cara continued, "I've told my brother to join us, I hope you don't mind."

That got Beatrice's attention. "You have a brother?"

She nodded. "Yeah. He transferred to Dauntless… oh, there he is."

Two of the Dauntless, a boy and a girl, sat at their table. Cara introduced them while waving her hand back and forth. "Beatrice, this is my brother Will and his girlfriend Christina. Will, Christina, this is Beatrice."

They ate lunch and conversed companionably. Will was nice and thoughtful, he didn't ask many questions and left Beatrice in peace when she didn't engage in the conversation. Christina was a little more invasive and tried to include her in conversation, but she, too, was friendly, and Beatrice appreciated their company.

While talking to them, Beatrice remembered how she had looked up to the Dauntless with admiration as a child, how she had wanted to experience this freedom and wildness. Will and Christina did indeed look free, full of the energy she had wanted to be a part of. It was nice to be included among them.

Maybe, she thought, maybe this was what being Divergent really meant. Maybe, one day, she would have friends from other factions and experience the lifestyles of several of them, she would be able to embrace her qualities from Dauntless and Erudite and Abnegation.

When they had finished, they excused themselves – the two Dauntless were required in a meeting with the Divergents, and Cara had an appointment with her research supervisor. Beatrice went back to reading, this time actually managing to lose herself in the text.

* * *

Half an hour later, Beatrice's attention was caught by the sound of heels approaching. While many Erudite women wore heals, she had somehow memorized the sound of this particular pair. "You are required in the meeting room," Jeanine told her without preamble.

Seeing Jeanine's emotionless demeanor made Beatrice feel ashamed of herself. Since the loss of her family, she had been hiding from the world, staring into space and letting her feelings control her, and this woman, who was exhausted, probably drowning in despair and crushed by responsibilities, was holding herself like a queen. She was in control, unbreakable and reliable, and Beatrice felt weak in comparison.

She needed time to grieve, but too much depended on the amount work they would be able to accomplish in the little time they had, and she decided that she would have to pull herself together, even if it made her feel selfish for not thinking of her family.

Jeanine lead her to the new elite Divergent group's meeting room, not talking on the way as she knew that, in this faction where everyone was more than competent with any kind of listening devices, the walls had ears. In the elevator, the silence felt louder, maybe because they were in such a small space. Beatrice wished she could say something, but she, too, knew the risks, and mundane conversation felt even more inappropriate than silence. They stood next to each other, staring at nothing, and once the elevator stopped, they walked through a few more corridors to the apartment now occupied by the group of Divergents.

Once safely in the room, Jeanine turned towards Beatrice. Seeing her features from up close made Beatrice realize how tired the woman was. She had deep shadows under her eyes, her features were somehow sharper than usual, and there was an apathetic and slightly haggard quality to her expression that indicated how drained she was. The feeling of shame hit her again – they were a team, and she felt like she had let her down, so she decided she would try to see her later in the afternoon.

In the meantime, she focused on her words. "Beatrice, I suggested that you join the others for some training, as you will be awake and conscious during the simulation, and are therefore likely to be in danger." She also hoped it would snap her out of this state of numbness. "Two of the Dauntless have agreed to teach you a few fighting skills."

To Beatrice's pleasant surprise, Christina was going to be teaching her, along with a boy who seemed to be somewhat of a leader among the group – he looked two or three years older than them and clearly had some authority – and who introduced himself as Four.

Jeanine left them to work in her office, hoping to contact other faction leaders and make allies more officially, and Beatrice spent the afternoon working with them. The physical training felt good; while the mental distraction of academia had been welcome, she could appreciate the relief of physical fighting. They taught her the basics of using a gun, and some techniques to survive facing armed and trained soldiers.

The little time they had would not be enough to really teach her fighting or even improve her stamina, but a few tricks and some improvements in technique could save her life, Four had said.

Fighting until she was sweating and exhausted was a relief, it eased the tension which had caused her to snap. Using weapons was different, but no less helpful. The focus needed to aim at a target, with a knife or a gun, required her to forget about everything else around her, and she felt grounded again for the first time in days.

"You're kinda good at this," Christina said with a tone of surprise.

Beatrice smiled, she had taken an immediate liking to her. From the other side, Four nodded, "I was thinking the same… you're Divergent, right? Do you have aptitude for Dauntless?"

"Yeah. Erudite, Dauntless, and…and Abnegation." It hurt to talk about her old faction, it reminded her of what she had lost. But it also reminded her of what she was fighting for, and motivated her to put all her efforts into their work.

"You should have chosen Dauntless," Christina said, grinning.

"Well, yes and no," Four argued, "it was more dangerous to be Divergent there, and easy to be discovered." He remembered his friend Amar, how Eric had gotten away with it already then. "We barely made it out during the simulation… It's good that Erudite is protecting us now, who knows where we would be otherwise."


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter Eleven**

After the training session, Beatrice went to her rooms for a shower and a change of clothes. She chose a pair of simple but elegant blue trousers and a white button-down shirt, tied her hair back in a ponytail, and felt more human than she had done in days. After that, she decided to try to see if Jeanine was in her office.

She was. Her knock was answered immediately by the cold voice she was now familiar with, and as she entered the familiar office, she could nearly have forgotten all that had happened – it felt like a normal day, going to work with Jeanine in the lab.

Jeanine wasn't surprised to see Beatrice, she knew the young woman would feel like she owed her an apology which, really, she didn't. Once she was sitting, Beatrice remained silent, unsure of how to begin. Jeanine sighed, and addressed the young woman with a hesitant tone. "…Beatrice?"

"I'm sorry," Beatrice finally said after a while in a small voice.

"You don't have anything to apologize for."

"I've let you down, Jeanine."

"You're in shock, you're grieving. You need to learn not to let it swallow you whole for your own sake, but given what you are going through, your behavior is not unreasonable."

"How do you do it? How do you manage to stay in charge, not crumble upon the responsibilities?"

Jeanine shook her head. How do you explain to someone who grew up in Abnegation the principles of Erudite education, especially those of the parents of the most intelligent child alive? How do you explain a childhood of being told that emotions were a weakness and the only ally was reason, years of being punished if an emotion slipped through one's mask?

She had become a machine to the eyes of others. She had always had emotions, only years of hiding them had made her very efficient in the art until even she couldn't feel them.

"You become good at something quickly when you need to," she finally said, and though Beatrice understood that there was more to it, she did not push her. "Besides," Jeanine added, "this is my job, it is my responsibility as a leader, not yours. Your participation is invaluable but you do not have any expectations to fulfill on that level."

Beatrice smiled. "Thank you." After a silence, she added, "I will do my best to help from now on though, you can count on me." Jeanine smiled and nodded, and Beatrice continued in a different tone. "I was thinking, isn't it dangerous for you to be in public all the time? Our alliance is not a secret, I'm sure the rogue group is looking for a way to stop us. Walking through the cafeteria like that…"

Jeanine frowned. She may have a point, but… "and what do you expect me to do? Should I hide in my office?"

"Not hide no, but avoid unnecessary risks. At least not walk through Erudite compound on your own when you can easily be accompanied by an armed Dauntless, or simply send someone else."

Jeanine's lips were pressed in a flat line. The situation was less than ideal, and she hated having to let others dictate her actions, but she knew that Beatrice was right, and, as more than her own life was at stake, she nodded.

* * *

Training continued the same way for a few days. The Dauntless taught basic fighting skills to Divergents of the other factions, including Beatrice, who, true to her word, had made it her duty to be part of the team, no matter her feelings. Every person made a difference, they needed as many Divergents as they could get. All factions could be helpful, and while Dauntless seemed to be the most crucial in the fight, Erudites were equally important as, since they would already be outnumbered, it was going to require not only strength but also cunning resourcefulness to be successful.

Beatrice's aptitude for Dauntless had been noticeable in the training, she had progressed quickly, and, while she wasn't very good at attacking in hand-to-hand combat, she had quickly assimilated techniques of self-defense, and her aim was excellent.

Her participation in the training had been an opportunity to make new friends from other factions. While she had been very happy in Erudite, she was indeed Divergent, and could now explore the other parts of her. Academia had been her main coping strategy over the last few days, but she discovered that fighting with Dauntless, surrounded by their easy social nature, was a great outlet too.

Christina and Will had been particularly welcoming. She had found out that Christina had come from Candor, which explained her blunt nature, and Beatrice appreciated the quick wit which accompanied her jokes.

They, as well as the few other Dauntless who were not Divergent, had been cautious at first, unsure of how they would be welcomed. Beatrice knew that they had probably killed some innocent Abnegation while under the simulation. However, she made the effort to consider them as victims too, as they had not done anything of their own free will, and they were therefore able to share their remorse and shock over that night's events. She hoped it would make them feel less guilty, too.

Beatrice quickly realized that they had no memories of the time they were under the simulation, which made the experience even more traumatic. It also meant that nobody really knew what had happened to her parents and brother. However, their guilt and dismay over the events slowly turned into an active force, a purposeful anger which lead them to invest all of their energy into the training for the defense of Erudite.

Beatrice was torn between the necessity for her to train along with all Divergents, which she knew was crucial for the coming confrontation, and her desire to help Jeanine. She could see that the woman was overworked, and wanted to assist her how she could. She probably hadn't had a full night's sleep in a while, and it was starting to affect her to a point she couldn't hide anymore.

Beatrice understood what was occurring, the few weeks of initiation in Erudite had brought her a good basic knowledge of physiology, which her own research had only deepened. As tiredness slowed brain function, it was only logical that it would worsen the effects of nerve damage, especially in the long term and with the addition of stress. The scientific explanation, however, didn't relieve her worry.

She would watch with concern when Jeanine had to support herself on the furniture as she walked because of fatigue and dizziness, or when she was obviously in pain and had to lean against the wall for a moment before continuing as if nothing had happened. Although she somehow always managed to go back to her crisp and stern persona when leading meetings, her movements were slow and her attitude lethargic when she wasn't in public.

But there wasn't much Beatrice could do. When she had brought it up, Jeanine had curtly answered that if she did not do this work, they would all be dead within the next few weeks, in which case her being healthy wouldn't do much good to anyone. Beatrice knew that she could not argue against this, as it was not her pride, but also her reason which drove her. So she forced herself to be detached and focus on doing only her own work, although she still tried to help Jeanine when she could, be it by taking off some workload, or by supporting her emotionally.

* * *

One morning, Jeanine looked up from her work at the sound of a knock on her office door, and was surprised to see one of the Divergents – Four, her mind recited automatically, Marcus Eaton's son, Tobias, she had always been good with names – enter at her invitation to do so.

"Ms Matthews," he greeted formally. "Could I have a few minutes of your time? This is important."

"Mr Eaton," she replied, and waved him to the chair on the other side of her desk. "Have a seat. What can I do for you?"

"I have been in contact with another group, and they want to join your team. They don't know any details," he hastened to add as Jeanine's eyes hardened. "I know how important secrecy is, and it is not my place to trust them or not. But they have a large number of Divergents and wish to help."

"Another group? But we have already reached out to all factions…" Her eyes widened slightly as her quick reasoning skills answered the question. "Factionless. How can you know they can be trusted?"

"As a whole, they can't. They are quite divided among themselves, with different ideals and goals, and not all of them can be trusted. But their leader is ready to discuss the terms on which an alliance could be formed."

Jeanine leaned back in her seat, deep in thought. She was very reluctant to work with Factionless, as they were volatile. In a way, to her, they were like Divergents, unpredictable because they could not be categorized, and therefore dangerous.

But they needed all the numbers they could get, and Factionless was huge. Like with the Divergents, she would have to take the risk, she could not afford to refuse help. They probably had the biggest proportion of Divergents, since they were composed of those who did not fit in anywhere. She also had to admit that they did have some requests which were reasonable, so maybe an agreement could be reached.

"How long would it take to invite their leader here? Their leader, not a spokesperson, this has to be an official agreement."

He nodded. "Yeah, she has already offered to come herself. Um, I'm not sure, I think I can get her to come in the next couple of hours."

They decided to organize a meeting later that same day. Four took care of safely bringing the leader of Factionless into Erudite, efficiently hidden by the Erudite clothing she had chosen. During that time, Jeanine informed the leading figures in Erudite who she trusted, as well as Beatrice, of the potential alliance. Beatrice was more optimistic than the others, whether because of her age or her divergence, Jeanine wasn't sure.

She wasn't sure, but, by then, she trusted her judgment more than she had trusted anyone else's. Some of Beatrice's ideas were unconventional, she thought outside of the box. With her, Jeanine had started to realize that not being only Erudite did not equate to being less Erudite. Beatrice was as Erudite as anyone else, and her Divergence allowed her to think in different patterns, using not only her intelligence, but also her other qualities, to develop her ideas.

And thanks to these ideas, they now stood a chance of survival. No, she would not underestimate the powers of Divergence.

* * *

A/N: Please leave me some feedback, I love hearing your thoughts, positive and negative! And suggestions are always welcome, too.


	12. Chapter 12

A/N: Am I posting chapters more quickly or is it just an impression? Hope you enjoy!

 **Chapter Twelve**

When the door was opened and the person she had waited for entered with confident step, she froze. Evelyn.

"Evelyn?" Her whisper reflected her pure shock at seeing her there. At seeing her alive.

It was Evelyn. She had barely changed, her traits slightly sharper, probably because of the rough life as an outcast, but her life had not been easy before either, so the change was nothing which would stop her from recognizing her.

Jeanine hadn't even thought to ask who the leader was, convinced that she was someone without identity whose name would be meaningless to her. For her, being factionless equated being nobody, and Evelyn was not nobody.

"Hello, Jeanine," Evelyn replied lightly with a smirk.

Jeanine's first reaction was to ask about her, about how she was alive, why she had cut of all ties with everyone, and what had happened to her since. She wanted to speak with Evelyn Johnson, not with the leader of Factionless. But she knew this was not a time for her personal wishes, so she focused on the task at hand.

Jeanine waved her to one of the chairs opposite her. She was thankful for the desk between them, it gave a professional feeling to this meeting, and added some physical and emotional distance. She would need that. She took a deep breath. "Before we can agree to anything, I need to know a few things. First, how many Divergents do you have who agree to get involved?"

"Are we just going to talk about this, leader to leader?"

She swallowed and steeled herself. "There is nothing else to discuss, Evelyn."

"Jeanine…I had to leave. You don't know what it was like, it was worse than even you knew."

Jeanine shook her head. "Evelyn, please…" She took a deep breath. "We need to talk about the reason we're here. Once it is finished, if we survive this, then maybe…" She drifted off, but continued. "At the moment, there are other priorities. We both have responsibilities which are bigger than anything else."

Evelyn sighed. "Yeah, you're right," she said, sitting straighter in her chair.

Jeanine didn't trust her enough to divulge any of her plans, so she let Evelyn do the talking at first. From what she said, it was clear that Factionless' participation could turn the tide in their favor. At the moment, Jeanine was conscious of how low their chances were, she had even started to outline a last resort plan, the plan she had always had in the back of her mind but never wanted to seriously consider implementing: the complete destruction of all data and knowledge owned by Erudite.

The very idea was horrible; they would lose all the research made since the Faction system had started, the medical advancements, research that saved lives. They couldn't just destroy the dangerous substances, as the basis for many recent groundbreaking research in molecular biochemistry was the basis for both lifesaving treatments and the worst serums.

So they would have to destroy nearly everything, and even then, they wouldn't be safe if anyone who knew about crucial information was still alive and could be taken prisoner. Seeing the ruthlessness Dauntless had showed themselves capable of in the attack on Abnegation, she was not naive enough to believe that old-fashioned torture for information would be beneath them.

All in all, Evelyn's entrance into the scene was more than welcome. Even though not all of Factionless would participate, their numbers were significant and their strengths varied – they could make the difference needed to change the outcome. There was only one point which worried Jeanine. "What is your demand? What does Factionless want?" She asked, mistrust evident in her voice.

"We want a place in society." Evelyn's voice was the self-assured tone of a leader, laying her conditions bluntly on the table. "A part of Factionless wants to abolish the faction system entirely, but they are a minority. My demand in this agreement – the demand of the majority – is that members of Factionless are treated equally, to the others. We don't want to be considered outcasts, we want to be part of society, like a sixth faction."

In theory, it was an idea she agreed with, but it was also something which would take years to implement. "This change would need to take place on several levels. Laws can be changed, but it's the mentalities you want to change, and that will take time. It will take at least one generation to even start to change."

She really hated having to discuss diplomacy when there were so many pressing issues, but if these few precious minutes were the price to pay to have their numbers practically double, she wasn't going to complain.

"I understand that. But to be honest, the most pressing issue is the misery in which Factionless people live. They depend on Abnegation's generosity, which is abundant but not always enough and, more importantly, it's degrading. And the health of Factionless people is low, we have no access to diverse food, not to mention medication. We are literally outside of the system of exchange and are therefore unable to live in the same conditions. This is what should be changed first. This is my condition. If we win, if we keep Erudite's knowledge and technology from the hands of Dauntless, laws to change that will be discussed and you will do all that is in your power to pass them."

Jeanine was surprised at how well Evelyn had thought out her plan. She had probably crafted it years ago and simply waited for the moment when a faction would need their help, planning to bribe them with it in exchange for the only thing Factionless had in abundance: manpower. Still, no matter how planned this had been, Jeanine knew that Factionless' involvement would largely improve their chances. She also had to admit that the current conditions in which Factionless lived were unacceptable – quite similar, in fact, to those of the Genetically Damaged in the outside world.

She was also aware of the fact that if she refused, Evelyn might make the same offer to the other side, as she might not care about the means to her end. She knew that Factionless helping Dauntless leadership would be a disaster, so she agreed to the conditions, and immediately went to meet with those involved involved in strategy to inform them of the news.

* * *

As she walked back towards her office after talking to her colleagues, she felt even more drained than she had previously done. The meeting with Evelyn had been exhausting on a totally different level. She hadn't seen the woman in more than a decade, she had thought her dead.

She wondered how much of a choice she had had in the matter. Was it unfair of her to blame her for disappearing without a trace, without informing anyone, not even her? She tried to push the matter out of her mind, telling herself that it didn't matter anymore.

As she approached her door, she saw Beatrice arriving from the other direction, apparently there to meet her, so she unlocked the door, let her in and followed her, before closing the door behind her. She felt slightly dizzy and had to put a hand on her desk for support, and Beatrice responded by placing a hand between her shoulder blades. As if strengthened by the gesture, Jeanine sent Beatrice a smile and went to sit down at her desk. Beatrice sat on the chair on the other side, and finally addressed the reason she had come. "So, how did it go?"

The calm discussion with Beatrice helped Jeanine regain control of her priorities. The events had unfolded in a favorable way for them. The conditions laid out by Evelyn were not an obstacle, the alliance would be even broader and more diverse, adding not only to their number but to their skills, and their chances were significantly improved by this development.


	13. Chapter 13

A/N: TW for anxiety. If you want to avoid that part, you can read up to the line and skip the rest. Thanks so much to my friend Sam for helping me write this part xx

As I said before, the idea of the Divergent Force and part of the plan here belongs to the amazing TrinineWriter.

I don't really like some of the chapters I've posted, so I'll probably edit the whole thing soon, unless I don't feel it's worth it. Idk. Anyway, here's a longer chapter, by my standards.

 **Chapter 13**

Jeanine had rounded up her new team for a meeting to discuss strategy and be prepared for whenever Dauntless was going to act. She did not know for sure what Max's plan was, as the hearing devices which were placed throughout Dauntless were well-known to the faction's leaders, who had been able to avoid spilling any important information. Of course, she had people who worked for her and who had tried to collect information from the few known traitors in Erudite, but these did not seem to know, or at least they did not discuss the question even between themselves.

They met in the meeting room connected to her office, as, since Beatrice's remark, she avoided wandering around when she could avoid it. It was also one of the few places in the compound which were not observed by any security cameras.

When Beatrice arrived, Jeanine smiled at her in her customary silent greeting, and patted the empty chair next to her in silent invitation. On her other side, a few members of Erudite were whispering, not wasting a minute. The Divergents arrived in small groups, most of them among members of their factions. Jeanine smirked. Their genes couldn't be categorized, but their social life clearly could. The Dauntless arrived at the last second, trained to obey orders but in the most last-minute way possible. Or possibly just wanting to make an entrance.

Those who had declared themselves the leaders of each faction sat around the table, the majority took a place in the seats behind. Most of the Factionless sat in the seats behind, though Evelyn chose a seat at the table close to her son. Beatrice was surprised at how large the whole group was, she had only seen them a few at a time, but they were a powerful alliance. Or they had the potential to become one, if they were organized.

"Good afternoon, and welcome to those who arrived recently. The goal of this meeting is to discuss our plan for when Dauntless will launch the simulation," Jeanine started. "As we do not know when they will attack, we have to be ready to implement it with very little notice." She paused to let the words sink in, then continued. "We know that they will not only attack Erudite with soldiers who are under the simulation, but they will be able to control everyone, although we ignore exactly how. As you know, those of you who are Divergent are the only ones who cannot be controlled by the serum. First of all, what is crucial is to defend our computers against both destruction and theft. They cannot be allowed to possess our data, or they will be able to use serums to control us all at will, they will be able to control us, erase our memories and destroy us in the worst possible ways. So we will need to divide you into groups, to organize the Divergent Force."

A man from Amity intervened. "What if we don't want to be part of the violence?"

And before Jeanine could answer, the woman next to him added in an accusing tone, "You promised us shelter, that did not include being recruited in an army."

Murmur rose among them, some in assent, some in annoyance.

Jeanine held her hand up, and the room fell silent nearly at once. Beatrice smiled inwardly, impressed at the respect Jeanine inspired. Once again, she could see the leader in her, why she was the best for this job. She radiated power.

"You will have the possibility to stay completely outside of the conflict," she said calmly, having expected the protests. "However, if we lose, you will suffer from the consequences as we all will, so I encourage you to at least consider taking part in the non-violent aspects involved in the protection of our data. There are roles in the plan which will not require violence, as for instance the surveillance of security cameras, which is in a room which will be protected. You will only need to communicate what you see to those who are closer to the conflict, to help to save lives."

They spent the afternoon planning the coming conflict. Jeanine knew that all those people would risk their lives, though at different degrees, and the responsibility was weighting on her shoulders. She was sending them to fight, it would be her fault if they died. Some of them would die, it was inevitable. She glanced at Beatrice, sitting next to her and felt her shoulders tense. She was the first person she had trusted in years, would she lose her too?

She shook herself out of this train of thought. _Focus_ , she told herself coldly. _It is necessary to risk lives to protect everyone, do not think about individuals._ _Control your thoughts, do not let your emotions control you. Emotions are weaknesses. Focus on the task_. Her mind automatically repeated these words like a mantra, and her face was devoid of any emotion and her voice cold when she addressed the next question.

* * *

When she started coughing about an hour later, she knew it wasn't going to stop quickly. She hadn't been breathing normally for a long time – the main effect stress had on her was shallow breathing, and, in the long term, it did not bring a satisfactory amount of oxygen to the body, causing a persistent cough. It was not the first time, the high expectation others had of her and then her own high standards put her under a lot of pressure.

She had learned very young to bottle up her emotions so that she would stand strong and emotionless, but they always came out somehow, usually in the form of panic attacks in the privacy of her rooms. Coughing usually meant that she had bottled up too much, and the panic would come in stride.

It started with the feeling of not being able to get enough air and a quiet but harsh cough. The sudden spasms of her ribs caused by the cough woke up the remaining neurological pain from her previous attack, she felt a sharp pain curl around her left side, and knew it could only escalate from there.

Jeanine felt her chest tighten as looks lingered on her for a second too long, she knew her cough had attracted some attention. Concerned that she would not make it out of the room without anyone noticing anything wrong unless she left immediately – nobody ever witnessed these moments of weakness – she decided she had to find a way to leave inconspicuously. She was usually able to ignore the pain and control her panic until she was on her own, but she knew she was too weak for that now, the recent attack, coupled with the lack of sleep, had left her drained.

She called the meeting to a close, with the pretense that she thought everybody should think about their contribution to the plan and come up with an answer first thing in the morning – adding that they would meet again in the morning. It was a sudden ending, but people never questioned her, and this was no exception. They did not even look surprised, simply following her decision, and while Jeanine was usually irritated by people's tendency not to think for themselves, this time she was glad for it.

Once people started leaving, she stood up and left as well. She could not say that she had not noticed that Beatrice was following her. She could blame her failure at telling her to leave on the fact that her brain was not in its normal functioning state, but if she was true to herself, she had to admit that she wanted her to follow, that she wanted her to be there as a friendly comforting presence. She knew that, no matter the feeling of shame and helplessness, she didn't want to face this on her own anymore.

Beatrice had followed Jeanine to her living room, having noticed the state in which she had left the meeting. When she let herself in and locked the door behind her, Jeanine was leaning against the wall, overcome by dry hacking coughs which, from the way her arms were laced around her torso, seemed to cause her pain.

She was feeling increasingly out of breath, she couldn't get enough oxygen and every cough was worsening the pain which had started that day in the lab what felt like so long ago, but was actually barely more than two weeks, before everything had happened. She was losing all sensation but the pain as her ribs were spasming, unable to hold her in a standing position anymore, and she felt herself sliding down the wall and suddenly Beatrice was there, talking to her, though she couldn't make out her words through the roaring in her ears. She barely felt the arms that were holding her up as her strength gave way and Beatrice helped her to the sofa, this time actually supporting her every movement as Jeanine was unable to stop coughing long enough for the weakness and pain to fade. She guided her to a lying position, and Jeanine immediately curled up, her arms still wrapped around herself.

She was pale and her skin was clammy, but her eyes were dry and no sound of anguish escaped her, not one cry of pain, only the shallow, irregular and quick breathing and the violent coughs which made her entire body shudder and her arms tighten around herself in a vain attempt to stop the pain. It was as if her body was reacting but with a deeply ingrained fear of being punished for it, and Beatrice couldn't feel more helpless.

After seeing her struggle for a few more moments with no improvement, Beatrice sank to the floor next to the sofa and rubbed slow circles on her back in an attempt to soothe and ground her. "Jeanine," she said in a low voice, "Jeanine, you need to breathe deeply. Listen to my breaths," she added, purposely taking slow, deep breaths. After a while, Jeanine started matching her breathing to Beatrice's. It took her a moment to fight the instinct to breathe shallowly to avoid the pain, but after a while of focusing on Beatrice's breaths, hers finally approached normal again, and the worst of the coughing slowly subsided.

A few minutes later, Jeanine started moving again. "What are you doing?" Beatrice asked as she saw Jeanine trying to push herself back up.

"I can't stay here, I have to go to my personal rooms," she said in a weak voice. Beatrice remembered that her apartment had additional security, so she knew it was a wise decision. Jeanine still had one arm wrapped around her side and was using her other arm to try to sit up, but she was too weak and the simplest attempt to force her body to cooperate was causing her sharp pains. She grimaced. "I'm afraid I'll need your help again." She hated to admit to weakness, but it was that or stay there. Usual aches, she could deal with, push to the back of her mind and ignore to a certain extent, but these sudden and irregular spasms of pain throughout her left side were difficult to ignore.

Beatrice nodded. Jeanine was looking anywhere but at her, wishing she was on her own, yet somehow glad that she wasn't. Beatrice sat on the couch next to her, and, noticing her embarrassment and understanding her feelings all to well, she smiled encouragingly at her. "Hey, it's okay. It's not your fault." She placed a hand under her, gently supporting her and giving her the additional strength she needed to move into a sitting position. "Come on," she said, "let's do this so you can have some rest."

Jeanine relied heavily on Beatrice to help her back up, but was able to stand on her own now that the coughing had stopped. Still, Beatrice kept an arm around her, supporting her physically as well as mentally, and as they reached the door and it unlocked when scanning and recognizing Jeanine's finger signature, Jeanine looked at Beatrice for a moment, debating with herself, until she nodded, answering the question in her mind. "You can come, if you'd like."

Beatrice was surprised but she was glad to be let a little more into her life, glad that her affection and desire to help were accepted as such and not rejected as something less genuine, like pity, or even worse, like a duty. Knowing that Jeanine was a very private person, Beatrice cherished every occasion in which Jeanine trusted her and opened up to her.


	14. Chapter 14

A/N: Sorry for the delay! I don't really like this chapter, it's more of a filler, that's why it took me so long to actually post it. But on the positive side, stuff starts happening again in the next chapter!

I'd forgotten to say this: basic painkillers don't help against neurological pain in many (most?) cases. Antidepressants can help in their stead.

One last thing; I have a question / explanation. My writing is naturally cold and scientific-sounding. I usually try to make it sound different because I know it's not a good thing. But when writing Jeanine's thoughts or words, I leave it the way it comes, because she has a very scientific mind. My question is; does it work, or do you feel it doesn't fit with her as a character?

 **Chapter 14**

As she entered the room for the first time, Beatrice couldn't help but look around with curiosity. The room had white walls and was well-lit thanks to the large windows. Despite this, it was homey. It was furnished with well-crafted dark wooden furniture; the contrast and warm color gave the room a less sterile atmosphere than the rest of the compound, it felt clean and simple but welcoming nevertheless. One wall was entirely covered in bookshelves, and Beatrice hoped that she would have the opportunity to explore it one day.

She sat on the edge of the bed as Jeanine lay on her side again. Jeanine hadn't dismissed her, and she wanted to make sure she would be okay, that the panic wouldn't take hold of her again once she was alone, that she wouldn't have to deal with it on her own if it did. Jeanine was still breathing quite shallowly, though now thankfully her breaths were more regular, and as Beatrice watched her trying to keep her breathing under control, she wondered how the two sides of her could coexist in the same person. This scared, broken woman was nothing like the cold and emotionless leader the public eye knew.

After a moment, she asked, "Is it always that bad?"

"No, several things were accumulating." Her voice sounded weak but it had regained the scientific coldness which characterized her. She had clearly overcome the panic – though the physical symptoms would probably take a while to lessen – and she was now back to analyzing facts objectively without letting emotions control her, even concerning her own health. "The panic is not new, but I can usually fight it better. I can usually delay it until I'm alone, and even then it's rarely as severe. My body is getting weaker because I don't give it the rest it needs. Don't look at me like that," she added in a different tone, "you know I don't have a choice. And the pain and weakness are much more intense than usual – I hadn't recovered from the attack, which is why I'm so weak right now."

"You hadn't? But–"

Knowing what Beatrice was going to say, she interrupted. "I took the antidepressants."

"Oh Jeanine," Beatrice sighed, knowing how important it was for her not to take them. "Have you had to take them many times?"

"On a near-daily basis since the day Dauntless attacked Abnegation, except the few times when I didn't have to meet with anyone. I wasn't able to hide it without them."

Beatrice barely flinched at the mention of the attack on Abnegation, and Jeanine was surprised at that. She wasn't sure how she dealt with it, but hoped that her friends had been able to discuss it with her. She now seemed to have friends from most factions, she was sure some of them had cared enough to help.

Instead of reacting to the mention of Abnegation, Beatrice shook her head, upset by the idea that if she'd been there to help with the planning, she wouldn't have had to go to such measures. "I should've–"

"No, stop that. You had a lot on your mind, and like I said the other day, it's my job, not yours. And I took very small doses anyway, it should be fine."

"How are you going to manage tomorrow?"

Jeanine, confused by the personal question, frowned. "Does it matter? I have to be there, so I will be."

"Sorry, I didn't mean – I just meant, do you need me to help, somehow? I don't know – start the meeting so you can come later, or something?"

"No, it'll be okay, I have to take care of the strategy directly, as nobody else has as much information. This is too important, and I don't trust them enough to process all information in the optimal way. I'll find a way."

Beatrice was unconvinced, but she understood Jeanine's motivations and knew that she wouldn't convince her to change her priorities. And perhaps, she realized, it was for the best. After all, the future of the city was at stake, she shouldn't value one person over the future. So she kept quiet, forcing her reason to rule over her feelings.

After that, they talked about the coming confrontation, but for once, they did not only discuss the details of strategy or the organization of the manpower. When they talked about the probabilities of success and failure, they also shared their hopes and their fears, they discussed their doubts and, this time, they did not attempt to hide the feelings of dread which accompanied their every thought of the conflict.

Once Jeanine had fallen asleep, Beatrice sat there for a long time, thinking. She wondered what could have lead her to repress so much her feelings, how she had learned to be so strong that, when she finally collapsed, she had such a severe reaction. While she didn't have the answer to that, she knew it could not have happened without a very strong incentive, one she dreaded to know.

At that moment, looking at her features, tense even in her sleep, she vowed to herself that she would do everything in her power to relieve her of the burdens she was carrying with her. She knew she didn't know her enough to understand her motives, but she felt that her emotionless demeanor was at odds with the humane part of her she was hiding from the world.

Yet, she knew that she wanted to stand by her side, to give her strength and hoped that she would trust her enough to let her. She didn't know what it was about her, but the woman woke in her a protective side she hadn't known she possessed. Suddenly, she had found it, the art to losing oneself that her mother had always preached. She had found it through Jeanine. Nothing mattered more, because seeing her so weakened had affected her deeply and had made her want to take the blows for her, protect her until things were peaceful again. She hated to see her hurting, and she realized that her well-being had become one of the most important things to her.

She reached out and delicately moved a lock of blond hair from her face, tucking it behind her ear. Realizing what she was doing, she quickly drew back. Still, she was reluctant to leave and lingered for several minutes before she finally stood up and left with one last worried glance at the sleeping woman.

* * *

When Jeanine woke up the next morning, it was with a new sense of purpose. Remembering the events of the previous afternoon, she first felt angry at herself for letting Beatrice stay, for accepting – hell, even asking for – her help. For falling asleep in her presence. What had she been thinking?

But then she remembered how safe she had felt, how understood when they had talked before she had fallen asleep.

It was the first time that someone had been there to hold her when she was weak, to ground her when she needed it, and the feeling that it produced overrode all the anger and the shame. Instead of them, she felt mentally stronger.

* * *

Beatrice had been among the first to arrive at the scheduled meeting the next day. When Jeanine strode in with a purposeful step and a posture which spoke of power, Beatrice had to admit that she was impressed. Even she, who now knew her quite well, wouldn't have noticed anything out of the ordinary had she not been paying special attention. She walked with confidence, voices hushed when she scanned the faces and addressed them all. If her movements when sitting down and standing up were a little slower and more careful than they usually were, Beatrice was sure she was the only one who noticed, and only because she knew what to look for.

Jeanine nodded in her direction when she first met her gaze. Her face was blank – if she was in pain, she was not giving anything away. People said she had no emotions, but Beatrice knew by then that it wasn't true. If she had still had doubts about that, the events of the previous night would have quelled them. How good was her self-control?

Beatrice shook herself out of her thoughts, focusing on the meeting. If Jeanine could put the planning before herself, so would she.

They organized the defense according to what people from each Factions were best at. They were all Divergent, but they had been trained as part of one faction, and did have one domain they excelled in. Dauntless would be needed to fight, Erudite would be needed as doctors during and after the fight as well as to infiltrate Dauntless and stop the simulation, Amity would mostly help with the communication between what happened on the cameras and those who were fighting and would need to be warned of approaching dangers. Candor and the few Abnegation would help in the fight, but less close to crucial places as those from Dauntless. Factionless would mainly be fighting alongside the others.

The point of all that would be to resist and defend Erudite until the simulation was ended. For this, two teams were created of eight people each, four Dauntless, two Erudites, and two Factionless. They would go separately, the second team would only come into play if the first failed. The first team was lead by Four, the second by an older-looking Dauntless woman whose name Beatrice hadn't paid attention to. They had all been tested to check that they were indeed Divergent, as one mistake could jeopardize the entire plan.

In the end, everyone had their role to play.

The remaining problem was those who were on their side, who had been part of the planning and training, but who were not Divergent. This included six members of Dauntless, among which were Christina and Will, one of Factionless – Evelyn – and three of Erudite, including Jeanine herself. They decided they would be hiding to avoid being caught by the serum, and while nobody was happy with this, it was the only idea they had.

* * *

A/N: The action picks up next chapter, I promise!


	15. Chapter 15

A/N: So I had a bit of fun with this chapter...

* * *

Jeanine woke up disoriented in the middle of the night after what was her first dream in years. She never had any dreams, they were a part of human nature she hadn't experienced since she had been a young child. To her, sleep was necessary to rest the body and the mind so they could continue to function, nothing else. She had no dreams, no nightmares, nothing.

But that night, it had happened. She had been walking through corridors that seemed to belong to Dauntless headquarters, and met Beatrice.

"Beatrice." Jeanine had greeted her with a small smile, wondering what she was doing there.

"It's just Tris, now," she had simply said.

"Tris…I like it," her dream-self had replied in encouragement – even though she was confused by the sudden change.

But Beatrice had said nothing, and it was then that Jeanine had noticed that she was wearing black with a touch of red, the colors of Dauntless, and her gaze was – not exactly belligerent, but empty of the usual warmth.

She was Beatrice, but not the Beatrice she had come to know. It was as if the past few weeks had not happened at all. How was that possible? The present events were irreconcilable with her recent memories, and Jeanine quickly concluded that only one of them could be real. That is when it hit her.

"This isn't real," she whispered, and concentrated on what she knew to be real. She thought about Beatrice in her usual blue clothes, deeply engrossed in a heavy tome, she envisioned her intense gaze when focusing on her research in her lab and the way she smiled at her whenever she entered a room.

And she woke up.

She closed her eyes again. She was breathing as if she had been running. It had not been a nightmare, but the dream had had a tinge of deep sadness to it, and, worse, emptiness.

She focused on breathing deeply and regularly. What was happening to her? Why a dream, why now, after so long? Beatrice seemed to have woken up some of the humanity she had given up so early as a child. How had that happened?

She had thought that part of her had been gone forever. Gone when the child had been been valued only for her intellect, when she had been pushed to become a machine, when emotions had been forbidden, considered to be nothing more than flaws that hindered one's intellectual abilities. At first, when, at the age of six, she had succeeded at banishing them entirely from her everyday thoughts, they had come in her dreams, but she had been monitored day and night for any moments of weakness, and had finally succeeded in banishing dreams as well.

It had worked for years, and, as she climbed the ladder through Erudite thanks to her flawless intelligence, even she had believed in the system she had been brought up with. She had been the youngest leader Erudite had ever had, what were emotions next to that?

She had only started to doubt these beliefs when she had started suffering from anxiety attacks as a young woman. Despite not being a specialist of psychology, she already knew enough of the brain by then to understand that emotions were part of what being human entailed; no matter how much one repressed them, they would always come back. Repressing all healthy ways of expression had forced her mind to resort to pathological ones, it was simply not possible to refuse one's own human nature without consequences. But she had been in her early twenties and, by then, her humanity had been too deeply buried to be saved. Or so she had thought.

Now, though, she had the proof that reversing the process was possible. Did she want this, though? For her, feelings had always been synonym of pain. At first, it had been purely physical, when she was punished for any emotion she had showed. Recently, the only times she had felt strong emotions had been during panic attacks. She had never experienced any emotion without suffering, how could she not be afraid of being human?

But maybe, only maybe, she could learn this. It would take time, and she couldn't do this on her own, but Beatrice had been patient with her. She had never turned her back on her, and had been willing to help when she had been so worried she couldn't breathe, or when had been unable to move because of the pain. Maybe she would help her again. It would mean opening up to her entirely, but she had never regretted trusting her.

She knew it wouldn't be easy. But if it meant that, after a while, she would be able to feel, without fear and without pain…

She shook her head at her own foolishness. She might not survive the coming days, now was not the time to take such decisions. But, she decided, she wouldn't fight herself if some changes started happening naturally.

The clock on her nightstand indicated 4:10 in the morning, she had slept for a little over three hours, but decided to get up and start her day – she knew she wouldn't manage to go back to sleep anyway, not now. She had a bad feeling about this day. It had been more than a week since the attack on Abnegation, they had not been active since as far as anyone she was in touch with knew. It wouldn't make sense for them to wait any longer – she had already been expecting their attack for the past two days, and the more they waited, the higher the probability was.

Less than an hour later, as she was sipping from a cup of strong black coffee, sitting at her desk and going repeatedly through the plans to protect the data and looking for miscalculations or remaining points to clear up, she heard a loud knock on her office door. She ignored it, hoping that whoever it was would give up, seeing that the hour was still so early, but the knocks became louder, and Beatrice's voice passed through the door. "Jeanine!" She called in an urgent tone. "Jeanine are you there?"

Recognizing her voice, Jeanine rushed to let her in, and as the door was open, she heard other noises coming from the compound – gunshots. Beatrice looked like she had been running and was wearing a gun and a knife on her belt, and Jeanine had already understood what Beatrice had come to say before she had even uttered it. "Jeanine, they're attacking."

"How?" Jeanine's tone stayed calm and controlled – her leader persona was in place, no emotion would crack her masks until the work was finished.

"They're firing some sort of serum injector, it makes everybody unconscious. I can show you, I have one, I got shot and faked unconsciousness until they'd passed." Beatrice opened the top buttons of her blouse to show Jeanine the piece of metal in her shoulder, and Jeanine stepped closer to examine it.

Running up to Jeanine's office had been her first instinct when she had woken up after a few seconds of blackout. If the serum only made them go to sleep and not enter a simulation that made them fight, it would be much easier to protect the data. But she had never seen the technology used in this small piece of metal, and feared it would have other functions.

Her suspicions were confirmed when Jeanine's eyes widened. "It won't just make us go unconscious. It is connected to the simulations, they can activate it whenever they want…and to make us do whatever they want us to. So it's a simulation like last time, except they can mass-inject unwilling subjects much more easily. In short, exactly what we were expecting."

"We can't find a way to take them out, can we?"

"No, not in the little time we have, they must be attached to one of essential functions of the body, made to kill if removed…" Jeanine was deep in thought. "No, Four's team will have to stop the simulation, as planned, and the rest of you will defend the data against Dauntless…and all of us." She hated knowing that she would be used as a weapon against her own plans, her lips were pressed in a flat line, her face hard, angry.

Beatrice knew the anger wasn't directed at her. She understood Jeanine's bitterness, but knew nothing could be done, so she simply nodded. "We'll take care of it. We only have to protect it until the simulation is shut down and destroyed."

"Has anyone seen you enter my office?"

"No, I don't think so. There wasn't anyone up here yet, the fighting is happening downstairs."

Jeanine nodded. "Then go." Just before she opened the door to leave, she heard Jeanine call after her. "Beatrice!" The girl turned around. "Beatrice, if– no, when I am under the simulation, if they are using me to stop you, if I attack you or if they make me bypass my computer security… kill me if you have to."

"What? No!"

"You don't have a choice! I'm just one person, we need to save the city, you're the one who can, not me."

"No, I won't. Jeanine, I can't…"

"What if it's me or the city? If you have to, do it, and forgive yourself."

"No." As Jeanine showed signs of arguing again, Beatrice spoke over her. "No, stop." After an internal battle with herself, she walked over to Jeanine and took her arms, then her hands in hers. Jeanine was silent and immobile, unsure of how to react. They looked at each other in the eyes, both pairs sad, but where Jeanine's expression was resigned, Beatrice's was determined. She took Jeanine in her arms, hugging her tightly and burying her face in her hair.

When she drew back, she gently brushed her hair from her face and her fingers lingered, holding her face between her hands. "Please, Jeanine, try to survive today."

Jeanine could only nod, stunned. She didn't have much hope, but she would try.

* * *

A/N: My apologies for making this _only_ a hug. _I know_ this is considered the ideal place for a first kiss, but I couldn't get it right. Please keep in mind that your humble narrator is aro-ace and not very interested in the rest. BUT, IF you particularly want this to evolve into romance, let me know. Consider this a poll, if several people absolutely want the romance, I might...try XD

That dream was very fun to write, I love parallels to canon within an AU ;) Please leave me your thoughts!


	16. Chapter 16

A/N: Hello! It's been super long (over a year actually), and I'm very sorry about making you wait. I kept the story in the back of my mind but didn't really know what to do with it. I still don't, but I'm at least determined to make something out of it. (Especially since this chapter ends on a cliffhanger...can't leave you on that, can I?)

So here comes, Chapter 16.

* * *

The fighting was going on here and there, scattered throughout the building. While Jeanine was securing her computer and preparing to leave the room with all protection possible, Beatrice was in the back of one of the fights, as planned. She was supposed to go fight only if the other Divergents with proper fighting training needed reinforcement, but she was nevertheless armed in case she needed to defend herself. In the meantime, she looked at how it was going and relayed information through the microphone in her hand.

She could see everything. The blood, the screams of pain, of horror. She remembered how, as a child, she had admired Dauntless, admired their strength and the energy they radiated. To the young Abnegation she had been, they had looked glorious. But there was nothing glorious about this. It was bloody, inhumane. There were no heroes, only human flesh that was being slaughtered ruthlessly.

Her friends. People she didn't know, but their deaths were no less horrible to watch. They were all people, after all.

And it showed no sign of stopping. Four's team had left nearly an hour ago, and Beatrice was starting to worry. If they didn't manage to shut down the simulation soon, the losses would be huge, and Dauntless would get what they wanted. Dauntless was indeed very powerful, and they were able to force all those who were susceptible to the influence of the serums to fight along, no matter their faction. Ultimately, they were stronger. That is why time was of the essence. Four's team had to succeed, there was no other option.

* * *

Jeanine froze. What was she doing in her office, opening the most secret folders of her computer, where the file that could end everything was? She had already bypassed most security levels, something she never did even on her own.

And she wasn't alone. She hadn't moved, but she could see others' reflections in the screen. Behind her.

That's when she understood. She had been controlled by the serum and they had made her bypass her own security, the passwords and part of the encryption. But the simulation had ended. She wanted to breathe out a sigh of relief. They had succeeded, the small piece of metal in her arm had been rendered useless. And the data was safe, though she had been very, very close to giving it to them.

The data was safe, but she wasn't. They hadn't yet realized that she was conscious – only a few seconds had passed. She kept her gaze blank and went through the motions of opening different folders in her computer, knowing that they wouldn't know what the codes she was writing were for anyway, and did some quick thinking.

They wanted the file above everything. So they wouldn't kill her, not as long as they thought she might give it to them. After all, she was the only one who could access it, nobody had her passwords, they were all only in her head, even the complex pages-long encryption keys were in her head, and accessing the data required knowledge in coding that nobody else had. In short, her death would condemn the data to never being rediscovered.

She risked a look at the reflection of the people behind her on the computer screen again. Four people. Two of which had apparently been under the simulation, they were looking around themselves with a confused expression. So they were not there willingly. She could use that, but they would give her away any second now, she had to be prepared. As they looked at their guns with a confused look, the two others – part of her noted that they were the leaders of Dauntless – looked at them suspiciously, then at her. Three against two, but she wasn't armed, and the two who had been here unwillingly were not actually on her side – they would not kill her, but they were probably not going to try to save her.

If they ran, she'd be alone with Max and Eric in her office. What would they do to her to access the data? She hadn't expected to survive, but she didn't know how much she could stand before she handed in the data. That was not an option, she had to condemn it immediately.

The next few seconds were a blur of action. Max and Eric understood that the three others were conscious and there was a lot of shouting, the two Dauntless tried to run, but the leaders tried to stop them and the four men pointed their guns at one another, daring the other to fire first. And Jeanine closed everything that was open on the computer, but Eric saw her movement and turned to her.

Jeanine heard the gunshot and moved to dodge it, but she was not quick enough. She felt the impact of the bullet in her side and cried out as she doubled over in pain, stumbling and falling to the floor. She lay there for a moment, feeling the sticky warm blood spread around her stomach. She clenched her jaw, knowing she absolutely had to control herself. She still had a job to do.

She stood up, only able to rule over the pain because of the adrenaline, though she was dizzy and had trouble standing. She knew she had only seconds before they stopped fighting one another and got to her again. She stumbled to the computer, typing the encryption key with trembling fingers so that no one would be able to access it. She was pressing her free hand to the wound to limit blood loss, but she knew it wouldn't help for long, she was already weakening.

The moment she had launched the encryption of the entire folder, she was sent flying across the room by a foot which connected with her ribs. She cried out at the impact and painfully curled up on the floor, panting. Her vision darkened, but through the pain, she felt victorious. She had saved the data, there was no way they could access to it now. Whether she survived or not, she had won.

Noises started to become louder as the simulation had ended and people all around the building started looking for the culprits. "C'mon, we need to go." That was Max's voice.

She started drifting out of consciousness and knew that her chances were slim – there was nobody around who would have heard her scream, hundreds of other people were screaming throughout the compound. Still, she kept applying the little pressure she was still capable of on the wound as she hoped – surely, help would come, surely, she still had a chance, no matter how small.

She was lying curled up on her side, breathing with difficulty and trying to keep her eyes open. She heard footsteps approaching, and saw Eric standing above her. Through the roaring in her ears, she heard his voice. "We may not have whatever you were hiding from us, but you haven't won." She was too weak to voice a reply by then, only her labored breathing could be heard, and blood tainted her lips. The last words she heard were, "you lost," and although he kept talking, she couldn't make out his words anymore.

But her last thought were not of his words, it was of her promise to Beatrice to try to survive. She had _promised_.

 _She had to try. For her._

Her vision narrowed and blurred, and, finally, darkness overcame her.


End file.
